All the Wrong Moves

April 29, 2019
In this thoughtful and clever memoir, journalist Chapin chronicles his two-year submersion into the world of chess. Bored with life in Toronto, he “became obsessed with chess after I ran away to Thailand with a stripper I just met.” She returned to Canada, but Chapin traveled and got hooked on the game by Nepalese street players in Kathmandu. He returned to Bangkok and descended “into an Internet chess wormhole,” playing with a club and entering tournaments. Throughout, Chapin describes the highs of playing well and the lows of when his “incompetence was outstanding.” After a few months he moved back to Toronto and fell in love with his magazine editor, Katherine, who distracted him from his chess obsession. In order to fully commit to Katherine he decided to play one last tournament—for a chance to compete against a high-ranked player at the Los Angeles Open—and began training with a chess coach. Leading up to the tournament, he fluidly explains the intricacies of chess, and through his training he comes to realize that, win or lose, his “place in humanity” is not as a chess champion but to be with Katherine. Chapin’s sincere memoir of self-discovery will charm chess enthusiasts, as well as those searching for their next move in life.

May 15, 2019
Journalist Chapin makes his book debut with a spirited memoir about his obsession with chess, a game that occupied him for two peripatetic years. The author first played in high school, when he joined the Pawnishers, "an after-school pack of sweaty teenage boys," motivated less by a desire to play chess than to "belong to some kind of cadre. Having a ready-made, highly ostentatious identity was socially useful." Soon, however, he was seduced by the challenge of the game, honing his strategy from Wikipedia and through online matches. He exulted in beating his brilliant older brother, a triumph that proved short-lived when his brother sharpened his own skills. Defeated, Chapin gave up the game until, years later, he sat down at a chess board in the streets of Kathmandu. Quickly, "that old chess feeling was returning--the dizzy pleasure of the potential maneuvers" inviting him "into a tumultuous arena of mental conflict." That encounter set him off on a quest to become a chess master, with the goal of competing successfully in the Los Angeles Open, an achievement "that would represent a violent assault against the limits of my truly meagre talent." At the time he reconnected with chess, Chapin was experiencing a vocational crisis, "not entirely convinced by the validity" of being a writer, feeling like "a parasite on my own life. Any compelling character I meet," he confesses, "excites me not only because they're exciting but also because I might describe them profitably." Chess proved to be a great distraction and, soon, an addiction. He joined a chess club and entered competitions in his native Toronto, studied with a "charismatic, frank, and viciously funny" grandmaster in St. Louis, and flew to India, "where chess was born," to enter a tournament. The author infuses the narrative with exuberant, often funny, anecdotes; glimpses of strategy; and lyrical reflections on why "chess is about the most human thing you can do." An entertaining portrayal of the esoteric world of chess.

COPYRIGHT(2019) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

July 1, 2019

Chapin began playing chess in high school, when he found camaraderie among a group of bookish students that formed the Pawnishers. A decade later, Chapin's pull for the board was reignited after a game of street chess in Kathmandu. And so begins a two-year intense quest to dominate the game. After an unsuccessful tournament in Bangkok and struggling with taking his skills to the next level playing intensely addicting online games, he decides to go all in. Traveling from one tournament to another, from Manhattan to Hyderabad, he gains some wins and many losses. In St. Louis, Chapin spends a month taking lessons from a chess grandmaster, an entertaining character within the book. Over the years, he has tried to end his addiction to chess, finding that in a game with infinite possibilities his skills were not improving as much as he'd like. VERDICT Chapin has an engaging way of describing chess games and the complexities in which players formulate their moves across the board. Chess enthusiasts will find this comical memoir with a sarcastic tone entertaining to the end when he shares the secret of chess.--Melissa Keegan, Ela Area P.L., Lake Zurich, IL

Copyright 2019 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

July 1, 2019
When does an obsession go too far? For Chapin, it might be the moment he finds himself with food poisoning in Hyderabad, struggling through yet another chess tournament and debating a sudden hospital visit. But this, Chapin points out, is what the centuries-old, globally revered game of chess can do to a person. Parts travelogue, memoir, and collection of factoids, his first book takes readers from sweltering Thailand to the streets of St. Louis as he walks them through his consuming love affair with the game and offers up trivia about famous moves, renowned players, and a glance at its larger history. When his infatuation is interrupted by a new relationship, he ponders what it means to know your own limitations in life and where to draw the line when balancing the thing you love and how far it can take you. Wryly funny, introspective, and grimly evocative, Chapin's memoir is perfect for a brief wade into the world of chess, or as a jumping off point for a much deeper dive.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)