The Life: A True Story About A Brooklyn Boy Seduced Into The Dark World Of The Mafia


Larry Mazza - 2016
    young Larry later learns she is married to the vicious gangster Greg Scarpa known as "The Grim Reaper." Greg takes a liking to Larry and makes him his protegé. He likes him so much that he gives his blessing for the affair to continue and brings Larry deep into the "family."

What was I Thinking


Paul Henry - 2011
    It will keep you entertained for hours. It's the very unusual story of Paul Henry - from his eventful childhood to his adventurous career in journalism to his recent outrageous comments on television which divided the country.A natural-born story teller, Paul spins many great yarns in this book. It's fascinating insight into his complex character. He's surprising -- he doesn't adhere to any prescribed set of beliefs. He's bold -- he set himself up as an international news correspondent working out of his Masterton lounge. And he's versatile -- turning his hand to running a cafe, running for Parliament and running from terrorists.

Chess: Conquer your Friends with 8 Easy Principles: Chess Strategy for Casual Players and Post-Beginners (The Skill Artist's Guide - Chess Strategy, Chess Books)


Maxen Tarafa - 2015
    No complex terminology. ★FREE eBook Download inside★ Your dad taught you how to play Chess, but he didn’t teach you much. You already know how to checkmate and move the pieces, but let’s face it, your friends and family still beat you more than you’d like. You don't just want to play. You want to win and possibly CONQUER ALL YOUR FRIENDS! You sly dog! I know the feeling and I’m here to help. My name is Maxen R. Tarafa and I’m a Skill Artist. In a few short months, I went from a struggling post-beginner to an adept intermediate player and doubled my Chess ability by teaching myself. In this book, I show you how you can double, even triple, your Chess ability like I did, but faster. But I’m going to tell you right now. My method is rather controversial. You see, most chess “experts” bombard you with complex Chess notation (QxB6?) and expect you to read complex Chess terminology. I don’t do that. I’ll give you a cheat sheet of what you NEED to remember, and you’ll be off to the Chess boards and killing Queens like it’s nobody’s business. In this book, you learn: -How to play your first 10 moves so YOU control the game (Chess Openings) -How to use 3 techniques (or Chess tactics) like bringing light sabers to a knife fight -How to identify one weakness, if you simply recognize it, you can win in one move -How to cut your training time in ½. Know what to study and apply brainhacking techniques. -How to avoid common beginner mistakes with time-tested Chess strategy -Where to find FREE Chess websites, apps, videos, and technology to double your skills -How to use the one principle I taught to Eduardo that took him from losing miserably to unbeatable -How to “bend” the Chess rules with little-known special moves (it’s not cheating!) -And more I taught a 9-year-old these principles and a week later he was beating 17-year-olds. Anyone, even you, can learn how to double your Chess ability by learning a few easy principles. You’ll even learn how to speed your decision-making and play speed chess. If you’re looking for quick and easy Chess instruction to double your skills, but don’t want to learn complex terminology and notation, this book is for you! Don’t let your friend, brother, dad, or roommate beat you again! Join the Casual Chess revolution! Plain-English Chess Instruction for Casual Players, Post-Beginners, and People who Want to Learn Fast! ★Now Available in Paperback! To buy paperback, scroll up and click the Paperback link (by the cover image)★

Learn Chess Tactics


John Nunn - 2003
    A basic knowledge of simple tactics will enable a novice to start winning games, by giving checkmate or capturing material. As the player progresses, his tactical arsenal will broaden, and he will start to play sacrifices and combinations, and develop a deeper understanding of the game. Players who fail to study tactics systematically tend to suffer from tactical blind-spots that plague them throughout their playing career, and thus they fail to realize their full potential.

The Rookie: An Odyssey through Chess (and Life)


Stephen Moss - 2016
    Stephen Moss sets out to master its mysteries, and unlock the secret of its enduring appeal. What, he asks, is the essence of chess? And what will it reveal about his own character along the way?In a witty, accessible style that will delight newcomers and irritate purists, Moss imagines the world as a board and marches across it, offering a mordant report on the world of chess in 64 chapters--64 of course being the number of squares on the chessboard. He alternates between "black" chapters--where he plays, largely uncomprehendingly, in tournaments--and "white" chapters, where he seeks advice from the current crop of grandmasters and delves into the lives of great players of the past.It is both a history of the game and a kind of "Zen and the Art of Chess"; a practical guide and a self-help book: Moss's quest to understand chess and become a better player is really an attempt to escape a lifetime of dilettantism. He wants to become an expert at one thing. What will be the consequences when he realizes he is doomed to fail?Moss travels to Russia and the US--hotbeds of chess throughout the 20th century; meets people who knew Bobby Fischer when he was growing up and tries to unravel the enigma of that tortured genius who died in 2008 at the inevitable age of 64; meets Garry Kasparov and Magnus Carlsen, world champions past and present; and keeps bumping into Armenian superstar Levon Aronian in the gents at tournaments.He becomes champion of Surrey, wins tournaments in Chester and Bury St Edmunds, and holds his own at the famous event in the Dutch seaside resort of Wijk aan Zee (until a last-round meltdown), but too often he is beaten by precocious 10-year-olds and finds it hard to resist the urge to punch them. He looks for spiritual fulfilment in the game, but mostly finds mental torture.

Bobby Fischer: Profile of a Prodigy


Frank Brady - 1965
    It chronicles Fischer's tumultuous public and private lives, including an analysis of 90 games that trace his rise to supremacy plus a complete history of the1972 Fischer-Spassky match. 26 photographs.

Mastering the Chess Openings volume 1


John L. Watson - 2006
    It is difficult to know what is important and what is not, and when specific knowledge is vital, or when a more general understanding is sufficient. Tragically often, once the opening is over, a player won't know what plan to follow, or even understand why his pieces are on the squares on which they sit. John Watson seeks to help chess-players achieve a more holistic and insightful view of the openings. In his previous books on chess strategy, Secrets of Modern Chess Strategy and Chess Strategy in Action, he explained vital concepts that had previously been the domain only of top-class players. Moreover, he did so in ways that have enabled them to enter the general chess consciousness of club players. Here he does likewise for the openings, explaining how flexible thinking and notions such as 'rule-independence' can apply to the opening.In this major four-volume work, Watson presents a wide-ranging view of the way in which top-class players really handle the opening, rather than an idealized and simplified model. This volume, focusing on king's pawn openings, is a book that will make chess-players think hard about how they begin their games, while offering both entertainment and challenging material for study in openings such as the Sicilian and Ruy Lopez.

Chess: Top Beginners Tactics You Must Know - Including Images, Tips, Strategies, Openings and More (Chess, Chess Openings, Chess Books, Chess Tactics. Chess Strategies, Chess For Beginners)


Anton Romanov - 2018
     Chess is one of the world’s most popular board games, and is played by millions of people from all walks of life in parks, homes, online and tournaments. This two-player game is played on a checkered board with 64 squares arranged in an eight by eight grid called a chessboard. The game begins with each player possessing 16 pieces, 8 pawns, two rooks (sometimes called castles), two bishops, two knights, a queen and a king. The different player’s pieces are colored differently and are usually either black or white, though colors may vary. Regardless of the color variation though, each ‘team’ is referred to as either black or white. The objective of the game is to ‘checkmate’ the opponent’s king by placing it in such a position that it cannot escape capture. There are other methods to winning the game, such as when an opponent forfeits or resigns from the match. Forfeitures are normally as a result of the opponent losing too many pieces, or if a checkmate is seen as inevitable. There are also circumstances where the game ends in a draw for various reasons, meaning that neither player wins. The first official world chess championship was held in 1886 between Wilhelm Steinitz and Johannes Zukerfort. The victor and thus the first official World Champion was Wilhelm Seinitz. Since the creation of the World Chess Federation in Paris in 1924, the best chess players in the world have been awarded the title of Grandmaster, which is the highest accolade a chess player can get apart from world champion. The latter half of the 20th century saw computers being programmed to play chess, with many home computers now being able to play with such a high level of sophistication that they can outwit some of the best human players. The first computer to ever beat a reigning world champion was the computer Deep Blue, which beat Garry Kasparov in a match in 1997. What You're Going to Learn: Origins and History of Chess Rules and Notations Movements in the Game The Pieces, Their Movements and Values Chess Strategy and Tactics Tips for Beginners What Not to Do More Tactics ...And Much More! Ready to Play Like a Pro ? * * * DOWNLOAD YOUR COPY TODAY * * *

Winning Chess Endings


Yasser Seirawan - 1999
    Pull up a chair and watch the world's most exciting chess endings. Then become an endgame master!Winning Chess Endings explains how to:*Relentlessly find checkmates, from easy to hard, in all basic endgame patterns*Master the intricacies of King and Pawn Endings*Win consistently in the most common endgame--the Rook ending*Master the pros and cons of Bishop vs. Knight Endgames*Seize the advantage in Rook Pawn and Queen Pawn endings*Play like a grandmaster in solitaire endings

Discovering Chess Openings: Building a Repertoire from Basic Principles


John Emms - 2006
    The key to successful opening play is not simply learning lines off by heart; instead it's the understanding of the basic principles, and here the reader is guided through the vital themes: swift development, central control and king safety.

Capablanca's Best Chess Endings


Irving Chernev - 1978
    José Raúl Capablanca (1888–1942) had no need for isolated artistic theory or compositions — he composed and created chess art as he played. All of his genius — intuitive, tactical, strategic, logical — all of his art shines clearest in his endings, as he himself was proud to declare, advising others to study them carefully. "In order to improve your game," he said, "you must study the endgame before anything else; for whereas the endings can be studied and mastered by themselves, the middle game and the opening must be studied in relation to the endgame."The best way to follow Capablanca's advice is through this — the only book devoted to his great endings, 60 complete games emphasizing the grand finale but annotated throughout.Irving Chernev communicates in his notes the mystery and wonder as well as the delight in discovering again and again the original, fertile mind of chess's greatest born player. "Virtuoso," "exquisite," "profound," "inspired," "elegant," and "fiendish ingenuity" describe match and tournament games and endings against Alekhine, Steiner, Marshall, Nimzowitsch, Lasker, Réti, and others, the best in the contemporary chess world. Capablanca's eleventh game in the 1901 Cuban championship (which he won, aged 12) "surpasses any accomplishment by such other prodigies as Morphy, Reshevsky, and Fischer." From age 12 through the last game in the book (nearly four decades later against Reshevsky at Nottingham, 1936), Capablanca fashions endgames in tense tournament atmosphere that seem like delicate, precise instruments dreamt at leisure.Here then is the essence of Capablanca, analyzed for the instruction of players and the pleasure of chess connoisseurs. Included are indexes of openings, themes in the endings, and opponents, as well as a bibliography and record of tournament and match play. Capablanca: for players, the epitome of the endgame; for readers, a classic chess study.

Johnny Cash: A Life from Beginning to End (Biographies of Musicians)


Hourly History - 2022
    

Thirty-six Years in the White House (1902)


Thomas Franses Pendel - 2016
    Pendel's attention. It is very interesting and throws many sidelights on the life of the White House. Pendel writes: "In 1861, or 1862, the Metropolitan Police was established by Congress at the Capital, and I made application for and received an appointment on the force. I made the first arrest, with the assistance of "Buck" Essex. The case was that of a fellow named Grady, one of the English Hill toughs. A roundsman said to us, "Boys, you take a walk down Seventh Street, and if you see anything going on, take a hand in it." Just as we got opposite the Patent Office, this Grady had assaulted, or rather was assaulting, a young fellow with a whip. I went up and grabbed him and put him under arrest, then took him to Squire Dunn's court and preferred charges against him. The Squire was busy writing for some time. When he got through he handed me the paper he was writing, and I was so green at the business I did not know what it was, so said: "What is this, Squire?" He replied, "Why, that is the paper of commitment for this fellow. Take him to jail." "On November 3, 1864, Sergeant John Cronin, Alfonso Dunn, Andrew Smith, and myself were ordered to report at the First Precinct, in the old City Hall, at one o'clock in the afternoon. We supposed we were to be detailed for detective work in New York City on account of the great riot then on there, especially as we were ordered to report in citizens' clothes, to conceal our revolvers, and to be sure to have them all clean and in good order. We arrived at the City Hall, and then were told where we were to go, which was to the President's Mansion, there to report to Marshal Lanham, at that time United States Marshal of the District of Columbia, and a bosom friend of Abraham Lincoln. "These were days that tried men's hearts, and women's, too. Men were falling at the front by hundreds, both in the Union and in the Confederate armies. There was weeping and mourning all over the land. Our nation was trembling with anxiety; we were all hoping that the great strife was over or soon to be. "Marshal Lanham took us upstairs and into the President's office, where we were introduced to him and to his two secretaries, Mr. Nicolay and Mr. Hay, the latter now being Secretary of State. We were then instructed to keep a sharp lookout in the different parts of the house, more particularly in the East Room and at the door of the President's office. " CONTENTS I — Under President Lincoln II — Under President Johnson III — Under President Grant IV — Under President Hayes V — Under President Garfield VI — Under President Arthur VII — Under President Cleveland VIII — Under President Harrison IX — Cleveland's Second Administration X— Under President McKinley XI — Furniture in Executive Mansion Originally published in 1902; reformatted for the Kindle; may contain an occasional imperfections; original spellings have been kept in place.

Chess Tactics for Champions: A step-by-step guide to using tactics and combinations the Polgar way


Susan Polgar - 2006
    Her use of tactics, combinations, and strategy during her games gave her the critical advantage she needed against her opponents. In Chess Tactics for Champions, Polgar gives insight into the kind of thinking that chess champions rely on while playing the game, specifically the ability to recognize patterns and combinations. With coauthor Paul Truong, Susan Polgar teaches the tactics she learned from her father, Laszlo Polgar, one of the world's best chess coaches.• Teaches players how to calculate the effect of a move in order to gain an edge over an opponent• For intermediate to advanced chess players of all ages

Spike Milligan: Man of Letters


Spike Milligan - 2013
    Unlike his scripts, poetry, fiction or even his unique war memoirs, these letters show Milligan's talent raw and unvarnished - irreverent, often brazen, sometimes cutting, frequently outrageous - a reflection of his complex personality. Spike Milligan: Man of Letters presents a rich selection of the funniest and most revealing of his missives - most of which have never been seen before. It includes correspondence with the most famous politicians, actors, celebrities and rock stars of his day, and takes the reader behind the scenes in his wrangles with producers, publishers, editors and his impervious manager-agent. It also includes letters to a host of unlikely individuals on some surprising subjects: rounded teabags ('what did you do with the corners?'), backless hospital gowns ('beyond my comprehension'), heartfelt apologies ('pardon me for being alive') and the pressing issue of the imbalance of male and female ducks in London's parks. Here, then, is the real Spike: obsessive, rude, generous and relentlessly witty. Spike Milligan (1918-2002) was one of the greatest and most influential comedians of the twentieth century. Over the course of his astonishing career, he wrote over eighty books of fiction, poetry, plays, cartoons, children's stories and his unique war memoirs. Norma Farnes was Spike Milligan's agent, manager, mother confessor and friend for thirty-six years. Her books include Spike: An Intimate Memoir, Memories of Milligan and Milligan's Meaning of Life. She lives with her partner in London and Yorkshire.