---
product_id: 30296914
title: "The Berlin Wall Paperback – September 1, 2008"
brand: "john cox"
price: "$253"
currency: NZD
in_stock: true
reviews_count: 8
url: https://www.desertcart.nz/products/30296914-the-berlin-wall-paperback-september-1-2008
store_origin: NZ
region: New Zealand
---

# The Berlin Wall Paperback – September 1, 2008

**Brand:** john cox
**Price:** $253
**Availability:** ✅ In Stock

## Quick Answers

- **What is this?** The Berlin Wall Paperback – September 1, 2008 by john cox
- **How much does it cost?** $253 with free shipping
- **Is it available?** Yes, in stock and ready to ship
- **Where can I buy it?** [www.desertcart.nz](https://www.desertcart.nz/products/30296914-the-berlin-wall-paperback-september-1-2008)

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- john cox enthusiasts

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## Description

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![The Berlin Wall Paperback – September 1, 2008 - Image 1](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/41PU7uJ602L.jpg)

## Customer Reviews

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 5.0 out of 5 stars







  
  
    Superb opening instruction
  

*by G***R on Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on August 21, 2009*

I am completely in awe of the author's accomplishment.How many times have you read about an opening book claiming to focus on ideas and been disappointed? Well, this time you won't be. Cox spends some 130 pages on deep deep explanatory material before he even starts talking theory. Now this isn't an easy opening and it's going to take alot of work to absorb all the positional motifs and endgame subtleties and piece evaluations, but the material is there for you. The book has done its job to perfection - the rest is up to you.You learn which pieces are valuable and for what reason, which trades are advantageous, what plans White will likely adopt and how to counter them, which pawn moves are appropriate in which cases, how to position your King, how to coordinate your pieces to blockade White's pawn majority, specific recurrent tactical motifs, and I could go on and on.Cox offers repertoire coverage of three systems of development after the initial position, Kramnik's ...Bd7 against Kasparov, Kaufman's ...Be7, and the contemporary ...Ne7, each of which has a different character. He does not offer coverage of divergences before 3...Nf6 but refers you to Mihail Marin's Beating the Open Games (outstanding itself, but in a different style).Now I mentioned that it is not easy material. Some of the endgame discussions, for example,  assume you have a clue, which in my case was a bit optimistic, but even in those cases it offers great material for study and analysis so that you can come to understand his points as you improve. The third endgame study, to offer one example, passes over a long corresponding squares sequence (I think) without comment. There is still enough simple material though for modest players to get their money's worth many times over straight out of the gate.The Berlin is one Ruy that you might actually get to play, given that it has a short entry sequence. If you don't get that far then Mihail Marin's wonderful book has your back. The combination is a remarkable collection of material that will help any player learn and play the open games seriously and with growing confidence. You really couldn't ask for more.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 5.0 out of 5 stars







  
  
    Masterpiece on the Berlin Wall
  

*by T***S on Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on August 6, 2016*

As I was looking for an opening to play with black, I came across this book, and after reading many positive reviews I decided to give it a shot. Reading the book I was very surprised how the Berlin Wall can actually be so entertaining (both to read about and to play as black!), given the bad reputation it has in the chess world as hoping for a draw with black. Against average opponents however the Berlin Wall is both a solid choice, as a rich choice with many options for white to go wrong and win the game as black.Pros:+ Very well-written, an absolute pleasure to read+ Completely changed my mind about this opening, after reading this book+ With Kramnik having beaten Kasparov with the Berlin, this is a durable choice as well, even if you get to the GM levelCons:- There is an annoying "bug" in the book which causes many punctuation marks to be missing, which makes it a bit less of a pleasure to read- As for the opening, it is not the most convenient in the sense that there are many enormous sidelines: before you get to the Berlin on the 8th move, white could already have deviated in many ways, and black has to be prepared for those sidelines as well. (Many of these sidelines are covered in this book as well though, but e.g. you may also face the Scotch, the Italian game, the King's gambit etc.)

### ⭐⭐ 2.0 out of 5 stars







  
  
    Be forewarned
  

*by F***Y on Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on December 8, 2012*

If you want to buy this book, you should first know a few things about it. It's not about the Berlin Defense to the Ruy Lopez. It's about ONE variation of the Berlin Defense, namely:  1.e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 Nf6 4. 0-0  Nxe4 5.d4 Nd6 6. Bxc6 dxc6 7.dxe5 Nf5 8. Qxd6+ Kxd8. NINE of the eleven chapters of the book deal with this variation. That means the next time you go to the club, you'll have to arrange with your opponent for him to play exactly like that; otherwise the book will be rather useless. Only in the last two chapters does the author talk about the "deviations," the deviations being anything else in the Berlin Defense which is not the variation mentioned above;and even so the author tells you that he only covers things from Black's viewpoint.But what is more surprising is the reason the author gives for doing that. He said that the things covered in the last two chapters occur more at club level, whereas the variation he covers in the bulk of the book  is more common in international level!In other words, the book is not for us, club players.It's for international masters. I wonder if I were an international master if I'd need a book like that. I'd have my own files.This also begs an interesting (rhetorical)question:who in the ultimate analysis actually supports this lucrative industry of chess potboilers? We do. But the book is for his peers. I had a teacher in graduateschool that told me that 98% of technical books are written by authors just to show off to their peers.And I thought he was too radical!Another thing you have to be prepared to read this book is to tackle the English. The book is written in extremely poor English. There are a lot of run-on sentences. You have to stop in the middle of several sentences and start reading them again trying to find the separation between the ideas because  there is no punctuation at all. It's terrible. And the funny thing is that the back cover of the book tells us this author is a lawyer!I keep thinking about this guy writing a petition to a judge in this kind of English. Has he ever won a case in court?

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*Store origin: NZ*
*Last updated: 2026-02-10*