How to Destroy and Preserve, by Yang Yilun. John C. Stephenson; 2000.

This is a very unusual go book, really more of a pamphlet. The main part of the book consists of 95 (small) pages; each of them has an illustrative diagram, a label, and a few sentences of commentary. The subject of each of them is something like how far you should extend in a certain position, or where to invade in a certain position, or something like that.

I really don't know what to make of this book. If you're looking for theoretical analysis or for problems, this isn't the book for you. But, on the other hand, it seems plausible to me that, if I just kept on looking at snippets of this book until I could recognize the patterns in it in real life (and had thought about why the suggested moves are, in fact, suggested), then maybe my game would improve by a stone or two. I dunno; it's worth a look.

For information about how to order the book, see the Wings Across Calm Water Go Club home page. They give sample pages, so you can see what the book's like.


david carlton <carlton@bactrian.org>

Last modified: Sun Aug 10 21:00:44 PDT 2003