First Steps: Caro-Kann Defence (Everyman Chess)

The description of the book on the Amazon store says the series is "the ideal place to start" and that it emphasizes:"* the basic principles* the basic strategies* the key tricks and traps"First of all, I'd like to warn you that this book is none of that.This book is a collection of complete games from grandmasters illustrating a few of the main branches of the Caro Kann opening. The examples and counter examples and also the analysis are instructive, but the author never claims to focus on the lower branches of the tree. For instance, when the author introduces game 29 from 2017, he says: "the Ng5 line is heavily analyzed these days and the coming game is pretty much the latest word on the theory". Then he goes on a variation concerning move 19.You can't call it a beginners book only because it doesn't include that many variations. For a throughout "latest word" I'd go for Houska's book, which doesn't focus on complete games but on the alternative moves on each variation. A book with alternatives to the first moves would be useful both for beginners and for preparation against players not familiar with the opening, but this is not that book. A collection of games is still useful to get a taste of the typical gameplay of the opening, though.

I love Andrew Martin's chess instruction. I've enjoyed every book and video of his that I've purchased and used.My only issue with this book (and why it doesn't get 5 stars) has nothing to do with IM Martin's instruction. The problem is that the fonts in the Kindle edition are quite wonky, sometimes bold, sometimes not, sometimes larger, sometimes smaller, even within the same paragraph. This is obviously a glitch.If those responsible (I'm not sure who that is; is it Amazon? the original publisher?) could fix the fonts, this would be a 5-star book for me.

An introductory text to the Karo-Kann and written very well. Read this before moving on to Houska, etc.

The book was in very good condition