Chess Visualization Course, Book 3: .
Description of the Sections and Chapters

Book 3 of the Chess Visualization Course contains exercises that allow you to practice visualizing variations that split off into two, three, or four branches of varying lengths. This is in contrast to Books 1 and 2, which contain exercises that focus on visualizing a single line variation of varying lengths.

Let's try to illustrate this for each book in this Course.

Book 1: General Tactics gives you the opportunity to practice visualizing variations that run up to 11 ply (six moves for White, five moves for Black) and beyond, within the context of the tactical themes given. In Book 1 you are asked to visualize only one line of analysis. Sub-lines (branches) are given in the footnotes to the exercises and are not an integral part of the visualization exercises that you are asked to perform. A typical analysis tree for Book 1 runs from 5 to 11 ply and has the following format:

Book 1 (9 ply):  w--b--w--b--w--b--w--b--w.

This variation consists of a total of nine half-moves (five for White and four for Black).

Book 2: Kingside Sacrifices and Combinations (with Preparatory Positions) gives you the opportunity to practice visualizing variations that run up to 15 ply and beyond within the context of typical kingside sacrifices and combinations. It is similar to Book 1 in that you are asked to visualize only one line of analysis, but the lines in Book 2 are typically longer than those in Book 1. The ebook version of Book 2 includes 1802 preparatory positions to help you visualize these longer variations. A typical analysis tree for Book 2 runs from 5 to 15 ply and has the following format:

Book 2 (11 ply):  w--b--w--b--w--b--w--b--w--b--w

Book 3: Broadening Your Visualization Skills (tentative title) gives you the opportunity to practice visualizing variations where the main line of analysis (the trunk of the analysis tree) splits off into two, three, or four branches of varying lengths. A typical analysis tree runs from about 7 to 17 ply. A visualization exercise with three branches has the following format:

                                            b--w
Book 3 (13 ply):  w--b--w < b--w--b--w
                                           b--w--b--w

Book 4: Adding Depth and Breadth (tentative title) gives you the opportunity to practice visualizing variations where the main line of analysis splits off into two, three, or four branches of varying lengths and one or more of these branches also splits off into sub-branches. A typical analysis tree with three branches, one of which has three sub-branches, follows:

                                           b--w
                                                                b--w
Book 4 (23 ply):  w--b--w < b--w--b--w < b--w
                                                                b--w--b--w
                                            b--w--b--w--b--w

Ideas for future volumes include 1) visualizing positions taken from the games of the great tacticians, such as "Visualizing with Alekhine", "Visualizing with Fischer", "Visualizing with Kasparov"; 2) visualizing the endings; or 3) visualizing positions that occurred in recent tournaments games and/or matches.

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