Writing and Publishing Update

My First Kindle Book Yesterday, I published Essential Tactics: Building a Foundation for Chess Skill (2018) as a Kindle book. If it does ...

Finishing Update

During Inland Chess Academy's Spring Break Chess Camp last week, I presented four sessions. My topics were weakness, patterns, coordina...

Bishop and Knight Checkmate Update

Forcing checkmate with a bishop and knight requires piece coordination and foresight. It is the most difficult of the elementary checkmates....

Making my Point Update

In " Bishop and Knight Checkmate ," I offered some mild criticism of Kevin at thechesswebsite.com . In his YouTube video teachin...

Rook versus Bishop Update

When I think that I understand something, I expect to be able to execute the maneuver in mere seconds. Sometimes, my understanding of the pa...

Checkmate Patterns Update

Some readers of Chess Skills may have been disappointed that my postings have been limited the past two months. Much of my chess time has b...

Playing with Rooks Update

Lessons for both my beginners and advanced students focused on rooks this week. For the beginners, the lesson focused on an elementary check...

Patterns of Contacts Update

Lesson of the Week [A]ny tactical operation no matter how complex, can be described in terms of different combinations of contacts. ...to...