Can anyone recommend a book about chess (or where chess is used as a plot device)? I’m not looking for tutorials, analysis of players or games, innumberable “White mates in five” puzzles, or other types of chess books. I’m looking for things like Searching for Bobby Fischer which was partly about chess but more about the relationship between a father and his son. ideas would include biographies of famous players (without in-depth analysis of their play), books about the role of chess in society, etc.
Fiction or non-fiction, I don’t have a preference.
Also Amy Tan’s short story “The Rules of the Game” - a young Chinese girl (surprise!) becomes a local chess champion but also has to deal with family loyalties.
A rather cheesey, but quite well written “summer beach” book is “The Eight” that tries to tie a lot of mystical and mysterious stuff into the International Chess Competition.
Not so much about chess or chess theory, but more of a fictional exploration of what “makes” a chess master…
Well, for chess as a plot device, there’s Queenmagic, Kingmagic by Ian Watson, a fantasy set in a world that works more or less according to the rules of chess. It’s been a long time, but I recall it as pretty good.