Dvoretsky’s Endgame Manual: FastTrack Edition

by Mark Dvoretsky

Mark Dvoretsky’s Endgame Manual first appeared in 2003 and has long been counted among the best one-volume treatments of the endgame ever published. Its thoroughness, though, is also its hurdle: many readers open it, meet page after page of deep analysis, and quietly put it back on the shelf. The FastTrack Edition exists to remove that hurdle and help you become a competent endgame player more quickly.Dvoretsky himself had already pointed the way. In the full Manual, the material he considered compulsory for every player was printed in bold. This version takes that core — the fundamental positions, the guiding rules and the working methods — and puts it front and centre, so each subject can be learned properly before you ever need the most intricate lines. Think of it as a companion to the complete work, not a substitute for it: the teaching is still entirely Dvoretsky’s, simply arranged for more efficient study.Nothing is skipped in terms of scope. The chapters follow Dvoretsky’s familiar sequence, from king-and-pawn endings through knights and bishops (including the slippery world of opposite-coloured bishops), on to rook endings — the type you will meet most often over the board — then queen endings and, finally, general endgame ideas. Karsten Müller and Alex Fishbein contribute fresh introductory material, and Ian Rogers supplies the foreword.Club players who want the endgame knowledge that truly matters, in a form they will actually finish, are the natural audience — and anyone who works through it will be well prepared to tackle the complete Manual afterwards.