My First Chess Opening Repertoire for Black and White

In My First Chess Opening Repertoire you will learn how to play the opening. This book gives you a compact and easy-to-learn repertoire for White, starting with the move 1.e4. And it gives you a similar repertoire for Black, with answers to all of White's approaches.

For beginners and improvers, for anyone with a rating up to 1200 (or even higher!), there is probably no better guide than Christof Sielecki, who has already published four opening books and more than a dozen courses on the Chessable platform. He knows exactly what his students need and has indeed received thousands of five-star ratings. The author strikes the perfect balance between fun, easy to understand and theoretically sound opening choices. And he keeps it entertaining with attacking and counterattacking lines!

First you'll learn the general opening principles that will guide you in any situation - even if your opponent doesn't play the exact moves in the book. Then you'll learn specific variations that will improve both your opening play and your general understanding of chess.

With White you will start with 1.e4 and build your repertoire around timeless opening principles with logical moves that almost play themselves. With Black, for example, you will study the Sicilian Defence - an opening that guarantees you the most interesting games and the most attacking opportunities.

This repertoire will allow you to hit the ground running.

Christof Sielecki is an International Master from Germany. He has coached chess for many years and runs a popular YouTube channel called ChessExplained. He won numerous awards with his course on Chessable and has created three volumes of the Keep it Simple opening manuals.