Street Smart Chess is an expert guide to scoring more points at the chessboard. When does it pay off to play hard for a win? Or safe for a draw? And how do you adapt your playing style accordingly?

GM Axel Smith answers these questions, and more, by using a world-class player as a model for each chapter. Learn how Magnus Carlsen grinds out wins from level positions; how David Navara beats lower-rated opponents, and how Baskaran Adhiban beats higher-rated ones! Or serve-and-volley in the opening like Peter Heine Nielsen.

Playing well is a good start in chess, but you also need to be Street Smart.

Axel Smith is the award-winning author of The Woodpecker Method, Pump Up Your Rating and e3 Poison, which were all enthusiastically received by readers and reviewers. Using the Woodpecker as part of his training, as an adult he improved from a rating of 2100 to becoming a Grandmaster.

Reviews

"Swedish Grandmaster Axel Smith’s fourth book for Quality Chess is aimed at achieving better practical results for the tournament player... While Smith is the author of this book, he is by no means the sole contributor to its content with Baskaran Adhiban, David Navar, Aryan Tari, Bu Xiangzhi, Ulf Andersson, Laurent Fressinet and Peter Heine Nielsen all part of the project. Each of these world class Grandmasters has interesting things to say.

Street Smart Chess is full of well annotated games and exercises that support the points the author and contributors are trying to make. The level of the content varies, but this book is primarily aimed at players from 2000-2300, though I suspect even stronger players will find much of interest."

IM John Donaldson

"If you’re, say 2200+, or perhaps 1800+ and ambitious to reach that level, you’ll probably find this book very helpful. If you’re a club player hoping for a stimulating read that will perhaps gain you a few rating points, you’ll certainly find much to interest, educate and entertain you, although you might not find all the chapters equally valuable."

"I should add that, as always from Quality Chess, the production values are excellent and put other publishers to shame."

Richard James, British Chess News (full review)

"Axel Smith has already written several books, such as 'Pump up your rating' and 'The Woodpecker Method'. The common thread in his work is how to quickly learn to score better results. Also in his latest book 'Street Smart Chess' he makes a very successful attempt to show the reader how to score more points.

The book contains more than enough educational material to spend a good amount of time with and certainly to get something from it. For me, the title reflects the core of competitive chess: using the skills you possess to the maximum and with some cunning."