Smerdon's Scandinavian

I am not a Scandi fan but have always been partial to the Nf6 variation. This book does a good job of making this opening playable and fun. My results have been surprisingly positive. There is only one line that I have faced several times that Smerdon does not mention and that is 1.e4 d5 2.Nf3!?. So make sure you investigate this one on your own. For all the rest the book does a very good job and this opening brings life back into my black games vs 1.e4.

The thought of 1. e4 d5 has never been in my wheelhouse. However, I enjoy playing more off-beat openings at FTF tournaments (Budapest, Dutch, Bird, Kings Gambit, etc.) and this book is so intriguing that I plan on going through it with a fine-toothed comb. If you want to have some fun and not play what Carlsen and the other top players play then this book is for you.

Excellent coverage of a spicy black opening. The variations are well-covered and Smerdon writes the book like he's your coach. The opening is very interesting, filled with tons of possibilities. The only problem is that if you play these lines there is an incredible amount of study necessary. So, if you want to play this it's going to be a lot of work. However, I can see where if you are a serious player this could be an excellent opening system. There are some amazing combinations and possibilities here.

An email from Amazon suggested I might like this book, I didn't think I would because I like the Qa5 Scandinavian and I've not been impressed when players play the Portuguese variation.... But I watched a Smerdon lecture on-line, and watched some of his games too... Did you know he got a draw with Carlson? About the book, I knew I had to get a copy . ... I just got this the other day and I've only read a little and played over a few of the great games...and from what I've seen in the book (and from watching Smerdon talk about it on-line) it looks fantastic. Very recently I played this Smerdon's Scandinavian as Black at Chesstempo.com (5 min + 5 sec) with only minimal knowledge of the defense:.[Result "0-1"][Date "2017.10.24"]1.e4 d5 2.exd5 Nf6 3.d4 Bg4 4.f3 Bf5 5.c4 e6 6.dxe6 Bb4+ 7.Nc3 Nc6 8.exf7+ Kxf79.d5 Re8+ 10.Be2 Ne5 11.Kf2 Bc5+ 12.Be3 Bxe3+ 13.Kxe3 Neg4+ 14.Kf4 Qd6+ 15.Kg5h6+ 16.Kh4 g5+ 17.Kh3 Nf2# 0-1What amazing fun that game was. I am anxious to really "Learn this defense."P.S. My online rating is 1941; official USCF rating is 1893 (but is a bit dated)Update: 11-7-17: I looked over the Icelandic Gambit section of the book and was surprised to see a recommendation of Qe7 blocking the Bishop on f8. But the move has its points. Moments ago I played this gambit. It started like this:1.e4 d52.exd5 Nf63.c4 e64.dxe6 Bxe65.Nc3 Qe7 (how strange this looks... but white now makes a terrible blunder...6.Qa4+ ??? Bd7+7.Kd1 Bxa4+ (White just lost his Queen and was checkmated on move 22,)Anyway... lots of fun.

I've gotten back into chess after a long hiatus, and am taking the opportunity to learn all the openings I wanted to play but never did. Chief among those is the Portuguese variation of the Scandinavian, and this is pretty much the best book in print on that. The author did a great job, and put in a TON of effort, which shows.Normally, I wouldn't have written this review since there are so many other good ones, but there's this one guy who gave this a 1-star review that really got under my skin (you may have seen it!), and I wanted to address that one directly. There's nothing wrong with 1-star reviews, but only if they're accurate! This guy goes so far to say that the book was written for "imbeciles", that the lines are only 7-8 moves deep, and then goes on to give his refutation of the entire opening. Here's the fact on this reviewer's "best move" that the author supposedly ignored: simply turn to page 176, where Smerdon discusses the line in question, and read the following "Not 8 c4?? due to 8..Nxd4 9 Nxd4 Qxd4 with a clear advantage to Black, as in V.Jerozkij-S.Krivoshey, Minsk 1998 (among others!)." My take? Maybe that 1-star reviewer skimmed the index of variations at the back, but I don't believe that he actually read the book at all. So regarding his horrible 1-star review, just ignore him, he's just another angry person being mean on the internet for no good reason.

One must realize this is a specific line of the Scandinavian where Black plays 2.....Nf6 and all the permutations of doing so. It does not cover other lines. As such it is very narrowly focused but it does provide an excellent and thorough examination of all the possibilities arising from 2......Nf6. On a personal preference note, the author has adopted using the personal pronoun "she" instead of the normal "he" in generic terms for white and black. I took away one star because it was very disconcerting trying to read it. A chess book is no place to attempt to change culture.

Opening books fall into different groups: Some give lots of games, others give lots of lines in a more dense format. David Smerdon combines the two. Each chapter in this book starts with some illustrative games with ample commentary to illustrate the ideas and then has a theory section.Smerdon is a clear fan of this opening - he makes that clear and it doesn't detract from the book.My only reservations are that there are a lot of oddball responses that are not covered; this will be more important to people rated under about 2000 ELO, whose opponents are likely to respond oddly and who are probably less able to come up with the refutation.

O livro é feito especialmente se o jogador quiser algo diferente. O autor aborda linhas não usuais que, no entanto, exigem muito estudo pois o livro é enorme. Recomendado para quem estuda muito e quer jogar para surpreender algum adversário.

une approche intéressante et différente de la Scandinave

GM Smerdon’s has created 490+ pages of carefully constructed work to explain how to use the 1...d5; 2...Nf6 Scandinavian vs. 1. e4. It could be described as a labour of love for a defence in which he has a great fondness. This is the book to buy for this variation.

Un gran bel libro. Idee innovative spiegate bene. Analisi profonde ma con la possibilità di entrare nel “sistema” con facilità. Lo consiglio davvero a chi cerca un repertorio contro e4 con l’idea di portare a casa la partita!

There’s something special about a grandmaster sharing the secret playbook on their pet opening. Like listening to a great composer conducting her own piece of music we get an insight into the mind of a master. For chess connoisseurs, this is a book of beauty full of moves that make you sit back and admire their loveliness. And just as author Tim Winton has praised the value of “useless beauty” as art, Dr Smerdon’s creation is a beautiful work of art for the gallery of the mind.Just look at the chapter on the Icelandic Gambit. Fans of 1 e4 d5 2 exd5 Nf6 3 c4 e6 would’ve been disappointed by James Plaskett’s evaluation of the gambit as dubious in his book The Scandinavian Defence. But thanks to the in-depth analysis of the critical Bf5 variation provided by Dr Smerdon, the chess loving nation of Iceland can once again be proud of their national defence and we can have the fun of playing it again. And that’s just one chapter. As well as the exciting knight move to e5 in the Icelandic, you’ll find other gems like the bishop sacrifice on f2 in “The Modern”, the rook sacrifice on e3 in “The Banker”, and dozens of other ways to swindle White in under 20 moves.But the book is also practical. It could be subtitled: “A complete defence against 1 e4” because it includes lines that grandmasters don’t play but which you’ll often face at your local club. Other books on the Scandinavian will say that White can decline the gambit on move 2 by playing the Blackmar-Diemer Gambit and then leave the reader in the lurch. Here we get 15 pages on how to beat it. And other books will skip the Panov-Botvinnick Attack as a variation of the Caro-Kann (as if a swashbuckling Centre-Counter player wants to buy a whole book on the Caro-Kann just for one chapter).But there are three things that set this book in a class above most other chess books and make it my favourite.Firstly, it’s the funniest. It has lines like: “An interesting variant of the mainline Wuss has arisen” and a chapter about greedy pawn grabbing called “The Banker.” The style of writing and the first-person narrative make the reader feel like a good-natured friend – who happens to be super good at chess – is sitting right next to them by the board.Secondly, the book has academic rigour. Where other books will just say that a position is unclear, Dr Smerdon will go the extra mile using computer engines to fight it out for days on end. Other opening books will often present several options and then leave the reader to pick. But Dr Smerdon always gives an honest opinion on which move he thinks is best and the reasons why. The book is accurate, it is polished and the attention to detail is impeccable.Finally, David has been humble and gracious enough to include photos and stories about the characters who have helped him build the theory of this defence: masters like Ian Rogers, Guy West and Timur Gareyev.If you’re only ever going to treat yourself to one opening book, make it this one. Because every now and again you’ll play a game of blitz against an opponent who just plays normal developing moves but somehow just got crushed. They’ll have a shocked look on their face as they try to figure out what just happened, and the answer will be Smerdon’s Scandinavian.