* chessbug@chessbug.com

Being a non-systematic, older player, short on time and an amateur club player, I tend to surprise my opponents with sidelines. Still, I have to admit that Starting Out: 1 d4! makes a very good case for playing the mainline variations of the white side of 1 d4. The author explains the idea behind every line with impressive clarity and, more importantly, in a friendly style and a good amount of self humor. For example, when analyzing Shirov-Radjabov, Linares 2004, Cox says, “I must say, my first instinct if I were Black here would be to collect that e6 pawn with 17…Rf6. Black never plays this but I don’t know why not, I’m afraid.” That is a pretty cool writing style, don’t you think? But let me take one step back and talk about the contents of the book. Starting Out: 1 d4! Is divided into three parts and eleven chapters as follows (Expanded from the review of Chris Hall in Amazon.com :

Bibliography, two pages

Introduction, four pages

Part One: The Indian Defences
1. King's Indian, twenty-nine pages

    Introduction, one page
    The Bayonet Attack, six pages
    The Fashionable 7...Na6, three pages
    Alternatives to 7...Nc6 and 7...Na6, three pages
    Black Avoids 6...e5, two pages
    Illustrative Games, thirteen pages

2. The Grünfeld, twenty pages

    Introduction, two pages
    Black Swipes the a-pawn, four pages
    Black Develops with ...Nc6, three pages
    Black's Alternative Plans, three pages
    Illustrative Games, seven pages

3. The Nimzo-Indian, twenty-five pages

    Introduction, one page
    Black Plays 4...d5, four pages
    Black Plays 4...0-0, four pages
    Black Plays 4...c5, two pages
    The Zürich Variation, two pages
    Illustrative Games, eleven pages

4. The Benoni and Benko, eighteen pages

    Introduction, one page
    The Modern Benoni, four pages
    The Benko Gambit, three pages
    Illustrative Games, nine pages

Part 2: The Queen’s Gambit
5. The Queen's Gambit Declined, twenty-one pages

    Introduction, one page
    The Exchange Variation with Nge2, three pages
    Black Deviates from the Main Line, three pages
    The Tarrasch Defence, five pages
    Illustrative Games, eight pages

6. The Queen's Gambit Accepted, twenty pages

    Introduction, two pages
    Black Plays 7...b5, three pages
    Black Forces an IQP, three pages
    Other Defences to 7 Bb3, one page
    Early Black Alternatives, three pages
    Illustrative Games, seven pages

7. The Slav, twenty-five pages

    Introduction, two pages
    The Bishop Sacrifice, four pages
    Black Plays 6 Ne5 Nbd7, five pages
    Black Avoids Bf5, three pages
    The ...a6 Slav, four pages
    Illustrative Games, six pages

8. The Semi-Slav, twenty-five pages

    Introduction, one page
    The Botvinnik Variation, six pages
    The Anti-Moscow Gambit, three pages
    The Cambridge Springs, two pages
    The Marshall Gambit, five pages
    Illustrative Games, seven pages

9. The Albin and the Chigorin, ten pages

    Introduction and Rare Defences, one page
    The Albin Counter-gambit, two pages
    The Chigorin, three pages
    Illustrative Games, three pages

Part 3: Black’s Other defences

10. The Dutch, fifteen pages

    Introduction, one page
    The Classical, three pages
    The Stonewall, two pages
    The Leningrad, three pages
     Illustrative Games, five pages

11. Rare but Tricky Tries, fifteen pages

    The Budapest, two pages (a quarter of a page on the Fajarowicz Gambit)
    The Modern, two pages
    Black Plays 1...d6, two pages
    Black Plays 1...e6, two pages
    Miscellaneous, one page (Includes 1...Nc6, 1...e5, 1...c5 2 d5 f5, 1...b5, The Vulture and the Tango)
    Illustrative Games, five pages

Index of Variation, four pages

Index of Complete Games, two pages

As you can see from the contents, this is pretty much as mainline-oriented as an opening repertoire can go so there is no escape from going back into the good old mainline Vs. sideline debate. Obviously, Cox knows that readers may ask “how can I, a 1600 player play Kramnik’s repertoire?” and he gives detailed answer in his excellent introduction. To sum up what Cox says, his answer to the above question is that, even though you will never play as good as Kramnik, you will still have many interesting games playing these openings, and more importantly, it is better to start with the “healthy” openings as early as possible since you will need them one day, if you are to live up to your chess potential. Cox holds that even Morozevich, a top-ten player, would have better results, had he played main lines. In my opinion, these arguments are not conclusive, but what defines the level of the book is not what Morozevich should have played but the clarity of explanations given by Cox and here come the good news: Cox gives you a more-than-solid baseline to build a 1 d4 repertoire.

I have checked Cox’s recommendations against some of the lines I have played as Black in my career and I must tell you – I’m afraid. Against the Queen’s Gambit Declined, Cox suggests the exchange line which literally caused me to abandon this opening (1 d4 d5 2 c4 e6 3 Nc3 Nf6 4 cxd5). This is not The mainline but the exchange is really frustrating for Black. You play defense for thirty or forty moves, without real counter chances, and then, if you are lucky, your reward is to draw from an inferior endgame. Cox explains the White side wonderfully and I now understand that Black’s position is even worse than what I had thought. Against the King’s Indian, my current pet opening, Cox suggests the Bayonet Attack (9 b4) which I admit to be most annoying as Black although here I am not fully discouraged because even though White arrives at objectively better positions, Black has many counter chances and my experience here, unlike my experience with the Queen’s Gambit Declined, is that White has many opportunities to go wrong.

The Achilles heel of Starting Out: 1 d4! is that, like other mainline repertoire books, Cox’s book deals with lines whose theoretical evaluation is rapidly changing. For example, in the Slav, after 1 d4 d5 2 c4 c6 3 Nf3 Nf6 4 Nc3 dxc4 5 a4 Bf5 Cox recommends White to play 6 Ne5. In this line, if the game continues 6…e6 7 f3 then, according to Cox, Black cannot play 7…c5 8 e4 Bg6 (see diagram) because after 9 Be3 White has “a comfortable edge”.

Unfortunately, the book was finished in May 2006, while on October 2^nd, 2006, Kramnik chose this exact line as Black on the crucial sixth game of the Kramnik-Topalov match, and drew the game quite easily! Am I saying that 6 Ne5 is no longer dangerous for Black? No, I don’t, although I do say that as White, playing the mainline variations, you always have to keep yourself updated about the last changes of position evaluations. I am sure top grandmasters will find new prospects for 6 Ne5 in the Slav (even if Topalov never tried it again in the World Match, thus admitting he had no counter plan). Furthermore, the fact that this position infiltrates into a draw in top grandmaster game does not mean you will not have interesting games and many opportunities to win (and lose) from this position in club level chess. However, if you want to have a mainline oriented repertoire and grow with it, you must keep up-to-date with what happens in top level chess tournaments.

As the one who wrote a whole book on White deviations from mainline d4 it is quite surprising that Cox is somewhat hasty when he deals with Black’s less popular options. Cox gives two pages to the Budapest and just over a page and a half for the totally respected Modern (!), but I guess there is only so much you can condense into 240 pages. Nevertheless, this is no excuse for the number of proofreading mistakes in the last 40 or so pages. For example, the last illustrative game starts with 1 d4 e6 2 c4 Bb4 3 e4 which is clearly an illegal move as White is in check (the second Black move should be 2…b6). The Leningrad Dutch starts with 1 d4 f5 2 g3 Nf6 3 Bg2 g6 4 c4 Bg7 5 0-0 which means White Castles while his knight is still on g1! It is not clear what is the real move order for White since this mistake is repeated in the illustrative game (Hellsten - Herraiz Hidalgo, Calvia Olympiad 2004) a couple of pages later (oh, the notorious Copy&Paste function).

Still the drawbacks of the book do not change my overall estimation that Starting Out: 1 d4! will benefit and entertain many ambitious players in the 1500-2000 ELO range. Cox did not write a perfect White repertoire but we must judge him according to the goal he set to his book. In the introduction Cox says that the book is supposed to help the reader “play 1 d4 with some confidence that he’s going to know roughly where to go in the opening stages.” This is a humble goal and I think that Cox has easily achieved it. In fact Starting Out: 1 d4! lets the reader much more than a rough knowledge, and in some openings Cox penetrates the logic of the opening with clarity that will save novice 1 d4 players many hours. One of the features that help the reader’s overall understanding is that Cox gives the reader, in short space, the historical processes that led to the move they see. For example, when in the following example [see diagram] Morozevich plays the anti-intuitive 11…g5 against Kasparov, Cox explains how this move is meant to solve problems that caused Alekhine and Euwe to abandon this variation as Black some seventy years ago.

Kasparov-Morozevich, Wijk aan Zee, 2000

If you are a young and ambitious player, and have the time to keep up-to-date with later developments of theory, or if you just want to play interesting games and are willing to lose some games against better-prepared players, then this book will prove useful and enjoying. You will not become a 1 d4 expert after reading this book but there is no other book that will make you such expert in 240 pages. Still, as an introduction to mainline variation repertoire book Starting Out: 1 d4! will give you hours of pleasure reading it and many hours of exciting chess, playing according to Cox’s suggested repertoire. You will not become Kramnik, Gelfand or Kasparov by reading Starting Out: 1 d4!  but it may be the first step on your road to chess mastery.      

The Good Things:

• This repertoire may be the basis of a solid repertoire that will serve you for a long time

• Cox is an honest writer that gives fair position evaluations and predictions on areas where theory may change fast (see first citation below).

• Complex openings are presented clearly, with some historical perspective so you get a good perception of why each side plays what it does (not a small thing as many moves of modern theory are rather unintuitive)

• Cox has a healthy sense of humor and he is the first to criticize himself (see second citation below).

The Bad Things:

• A repertoire of mainline variations, and this one is no exception, demands the reader to keep up-to-date with further development or else the repertoire will become irrelevant in a few years.

• Some sloppy proofreading towards the end of the book.

Quotes: “It’s only fair to warn you: grandmasters all over the globe are looking for a refutation of this cheeky move [11…g5] and have been for six years.”

“One final confession; after ranting about dishonest opening books, I’m afraid White wins all the games in this book. So shoot me. I’ve got openings to sell.”

The Bottom Line: If you have dreamt of playing mainline 1 d4 and did not know where and when to start, this is the time and Starting Out: 1 d4! is the book (but if you don’t want to keep up-to-date with opening theory then you better stick to your evergreen 1 a3 repertoire)

Rating: 9/10

Review written by Chessbug.

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