Small Steps to Giant Improvement: Master Pawn Play in Chess

This book is a true masterpiece of chess literature for club players.I have received the book recently and read it completely in a couple of days, going through all the examples, explanations and exercises. Shankland had the ability to categorise and give clear guidelines for all the situations concerning pawn movements, and leads the reader to more logical and thoughtful decisions on when and how advance the pawns in the game. The examples are all from the practice of strong players and are crystal clear, leaving the reader with a feeling of understanding and realisation. I think that Shankland has done an admirable job, the text is very clear and precise and nothing is left to chance, the variations are easy to understand for all club players and they are not overloading the reader with useless points. One thing that I really appreciated, and I think that this is a unique trait of this book, is that the author present positions, explains their features and then changes slightly the positions (maybe just a single detail), and changes completely the character of the position, making clear what pawn plans work or not, and why. This book is certainly the fruit of a long personal study by the author, and the chess audience cannot thank enough Shankland for his incredibly high quality explanations.