Secrets of Opening Surprises brings you a wide variety of unusual opening ideas. They may seem outrageous at first sight, but have proven to be perfectly playable.

An SOS deviates very early from the regular lines in a mainstream opening, usually even before move six! That is why it is so easy to actually bring the variation on the board.

You will baffle your opponent without having studied large quantities of stuffy theory.

Please have a quick look at the SOS's in this issue

Contents
1 - Jeroen Bosch - The SOS Files
2 - Jeroen Bosch - SOS in the Lasker Defence
3 - Simon Williams - King’s Gambit: Tartakower Variation
4 - Alexander Finkel - An Opening Bomb in the Slav
5 - Dimitri Reinderman - Sicilian Najdorf: the ‘Mejvik Variation’
6 - Sinisa Drazic - A King’s Indian Surprise
7 - Igor Lysyj - Queen’s Indian: Chernyshov’s Line
8 - Jeroen Bosch - An Unusual Taimanov
9 - Maurits Wind - The Mayet Defence
10 - Arthur Kogan - English Opening: Early Inspiration
11 - Alexander Finkel - Caro-Kann Advanced: an SOS Trend
12 - Matthieu Cornette - Grünfeld Fianchetto: a New Idea
13 - Max Illingworth - Sicilian: the Illingworth Gambit
14 - Jeroen Bosch - Avoiding the King’s Indian Sämisch
15 - Sinisa Drazic - Sicilian: the Bücker-Welling Variation
16 - Jeroen Bosch - Fianchetto in the Alekhine Four Pawns
17 - Arthur Kogan - King’s Gambit – a Patzer Check

Readers of this series can ignore large areas of the ever expanding chess opening theory.

They can concentrate on these surprising ideas, because SOS variations deviate very early from the regular lines in mainstream openings.

Ideal for players who don’t have enough time to keep abreast with main line theory.

Rick Kennedy, ChessVille:
"For anyone who wants off-beat but sound and energetic ideas to punch up their opening repertoire, SOS is a great tonic."

Paul Motwani, The Scotsman:
"Full of delightful twists which I look forward to trying out myself in future games."

Carsten Hansen, ChessCafe:
"The variations can be exceedingly difficult if you are not prepared."

IM Watson, The Week In Chess:
"The most entertaining of books about openings that I know of (...) I recommend SOS because it is so much fun, to be sure, but also for its practical utility."

Joe Petrolito, Australian Chess:
"These suggestions are very attractive to club players."