Hi,

I was wondering if anyone had any thoughts about these two books? How many problems per book? Useful study for a mid-dan or better spending time elsewhere? Worth 25$ each?

Thank-you

http://www.senseis.xmp.net/?ShukoTheOnlyMove

I have these books. As a mid-SDK, they are above my level, but I've still been able to get a bit out of them. Generally they take a game between two pros at the point where they get weird, and look at the best way to attack or stabilise the situation, often with some suprisingly normal looking move, and then a detailed sequence of how they expect the game to go from there. All of the problems are whole board problems, being game examples. It's done in a dialogue format, so you occasionally have a look at different options for the sequences that got them into the situation they are looking at, in addition to the actual question. They usually have 2 problems per page, followed by a few pages of discussion about them, with 2 diagrams per page generally. I don't have them with me, or I would put up an example.

EDIT: As a guess, I'd say somewhere between 80 and 120 problems per book? I don't recall exactly.

I should say up front that we sell these books, so I could be somehow subconsciously biased, but...

I really liked them and I think they're among the best books Hinoki's published so far (Perceiving the Direction of Play was the other one I liked a lot).

The material for the books was taken from the study sessions at Shuko's dojo, where young pros went to learn from the master. They'll usually review a game, sometimes with minor comments, until Shuko stops the replay at what he considers to be the key turning point. He then analyzes the game, explaining the most important issues in that position, and present 'The Only Move'.

In general, I dislike the phrase 'only move' because I think it's overused to the point that it closes people's minds. However, Shuko always provides a good reason for why he thinks his move is better, and usually it's fairly convincing. For me there were a few Go epiphanies while reading these books and I've no doubt that there's a lot more to be learned from them, given the luxury of time.

Because he's reviewing the games of young pros at his dojo, the level is quite high, but it should be good for you, Logan. We can presume that all of these pros are quite strong at reading etc, but the book does give you the impression that Shuko's on a different level. The main difference between him and them seems to be the clarity with which he views the whole board position and points out the key factors. To a lesser extent he also seems to have a sharper intuition for tesuji, haengma and the flow of fighting than most of the others.

Even though the books are presented in a problem format, you get the game record up to each problem position on the next page. I've found that playing through those openings and really thinking hard about Shuko's suggestions is worthwhile and fun, and I'm looking forward to doing that more when I have more time .

_________________
David

Go Game Guru: Learn Go | How to Get Better at Go | Go Game Shop | Go Boards | Baduk TV

Do you know the Japanese book it is based on? I couldn't find a title that struck me as 'Only Move'.

edit.... maybe this one?
http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E7%A7%80%E8%A1 ... 25&sr=1-20

edit two... or?
http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E3%82%8F%E3%81 ... 30&sr=1-35

I have vol. 2, the middlegame one. It has 80 problems. It's quite hard so suitable for a mid-dan (though sometimes I end up thinking the "young pros" (where anyone younger than Shuko seems to be called young) are kinda weak as I get the answer right and they didn't when it's something as simple as a one point jump in a running fight but maybe that's why Shuko picked it...). One superficial thing that annoyed me was the incessant "isn't it?" "you know?" phrases which are apparently literal translations of Japanese speech and are supposed to make you feel like you are chatting in Shuko's dojo but just got in the way IMO. Nevertheless, the sort of hard whole-board middlegame problems and answers it presents are not something I've seen much elsewhere so it is valuable for that.

I think your first edit looks like a good guess: http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E7%A7%80%E8%A1 ... 25&sr=1-20

I'm not good at Japanese, but reading the characters as if they were Chinese, Shuko i te, 'one move' sounds like 'only move' to me. What does that Hiragana bit in the title mean?


I got the same feeling with some positions, but I'm pretty sure those pros are a fair bit stronger than me. So much of their power comes from their ability to read quickly and accurately anyway. Maybe Shuko put the occasional position like that in to reinforce the importance of the fundamentals, or perhaps to bolster the reader's self esteem? Anyway, it's easy to feel wise when you have Shuko in your corner .

_________________
David

Go Game Guru: Learn Go | How to Get Better at Go | Go Game Shop | Go Boards | Baduk TV

The second guess is the only book that says anything about the Shuko Dojo though. Maybe I'll see if I can try to find both.

The hiragana means "this", and 一手 is more like "a move" or "the move" , so I would translate it as something like "This One Move". There's definitely no implication that there is only one correct answer.

The second book is roughly titled, "If it was me, I would play here" which sounds a bit like the description of the books with completely different title.

Watashi nara kou utsu is a different book entirely, also two volumes. It was published by the Nihon Ki-in in 1982 and consists of Fujisawa's analysis of games between top pros (like Ishida Yoshio), where Fujisawa thinks the players have missed a tesuji or other especially effective line.

Thanks, Gowan. I'll try to see if I can ask Hinoki what it was.