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Rating: 
Summary: Interesting approach to go
Review: A very interesting view of Go, with insights from a programmer's point of view. Well worth reading. I found that their descriptions of the basis of strategy in a game easy to remember and apply. Will increase your insight and strength.
Rating:
Summary: For Beginners Who Can Only Buy One Book, This Is It
Review: After learning the rules of go from a friend, he lent me this book, and I quickly progressed to about 15 kyu. While I have mostly moved on to other resources, I still find Wilcox's way of framing things useful.
Rating:
Summary: For Beginners Who Can Only Buy One Book, This Is It
Review: After learning the rules of go from a friend, he lent me this book, and I quickly progressed to about 15 kyu. While I have mostly moved on to other resources, I still find Wilcox's way of framing things useful.
Rating: 
Summary: Quickstart for (Young) Novice Players
Review: Bruce Wilcox is a long-term go programmer, having designed the now classic "Nemesis Go Master" GO playing program. If you bought that program in the mid 1980s, you would have also received with your game a 40 page booklet called Instant GO. In this booklet Wilcox expounded his theory of Go playing and programming - and introduced concepts such as sector lines, extending from walls, and contact fights. The current book appears to be a complete re-hashing of that 40 page booklet - with new and improved terminologies, more examples, and lots of inane graphics. The book's cover design alone suggest that Wilcox is targeting younger novice players (the cover is a sketch of an angular, busty woman with long flowing hair, scantily clad as an Amazon warrior imposed on an astronomical photo of nebula and galaxies). Judge a book by its cover? In this case, the cover accurately reflects the content - terminology throughout the book is non-standard and decidedly youth oriented (your groups are wolf packs, some stones are radiation areas, you will be engaged in spell casting, where you can reanimate groups, i.e. what go players know as life and death problems, etc). The book presents numerous "rules of thumb" that may be quite handy in games with novice and high kyu players, but are likely to backfire when playing low kyu/low dan players. In fact, Wilcox admits that most of his guidelines will work only 80-90% of the time (a generous overestimate I would think). Though the book purports to be a guide to "Oriental Strategy in a Nutshell", it is actually a guide to Bruce Wilcox's personal theory of go. This is not to say that the book is nonsense, and that Wilcox doesn't know what he's talking about. To the contrary, this book is interesting, informative, and limiting. I would recommend readers on a budget to pick up his earlier INSTANT GO pamphlet. Given the price of this book, beginners would be better off going elsewhere (Cho Chikun's or Bozulich's beginner level books, as well as the excellent Learn to Play Go series). Still, most go players I know eventually become go book collectors. If you've got the bug, then you will order this book regardless of my recommendation, which at best is only lukewarm.
Rating:
Summary: Quickstart for (Young) Novice Players
Review: Bruce Wilcox is a long-term go programmer, having designed the now classic "Nemesis Go Master" GO playing program. If you bought that program in the mid 1980s, you would have also received with your game a 40 page booklet called Instant GO. In this booklet Wilcox expounded his theory of Go playing and programming - and introduced concepts such as sector lines, extending from walls, and contact fights. The current book appears to be a complete re-hashing of that 40 page booklet - with new and improved terminologies, more examples, and lots of inane graphics. The book's cover design alone suggest that Wilcox is targeting younger novice players (the cover is a sketch of an angular, busty woman with long flowing hair, scantily clad as an Amazon warrior imposed on an astronomical photo of nebula and galaxies). Judge a book by its cover? In this case, the cover accurately reflects the content - terminology throughout the book is non-standard and decidedly youth oriented (your groups are wolf packs, some stones are radiation areas, you will be engaged in spell casting, where you can reanimate groups, i.e. what go players know as life and death problems, etc). The book presents numerous "rules of thumb" that may be quite handy in games with novice and high kyu players, but are likely to backfire when playing low kyu/low dan players. In fact, Wilcox admits that most of his guidelines will work only 80-90% of the time (a generous overestimate I would think). Though the book purports to be a guide to "Oriental Strategy in a Nutshell", it is actually a guide to Bruce Wilcox's personal theory of go. This is not to say that the book is nonsense, and that Wilcox doesn't know what he's talking about. To the contrary, this book is interesting, informative, and limiting. I would recommend readers on a budget to pick up his earlier INSTANT GO pamphlet. Given the price of this book, beginners would be better off going elsewhere (Cho Chikun's or Bozulich's beginner level books, as well as the excellent Learn to Play Go series). Still, most go players I know eventually become go book collectors. If you've got the bug, then you will order this book regardless of my recommendation, which at best is only lukewarm.
Rating:
Summary: Best beginner's Go book for non-Asians.
Review: If you want to learn to play Go well, this book will tell you what you need to know, in a very readable, enjoyable format. Go requires an East Asian philosophic outlook to be played properly, and the authors understand how to convey the necessary Go knowledge to Westerners.Even if you are an experienced player, you would probably benefit from this book. It covers recent developments in Go theory which older players may not be familiar with. Japanese Go books assume that their audience has an Asian philosophic outlook. This book doesn't. That's why it will enable you (if you were raised in a Western culture) to understand Go from a more Asian viewpoint. This is essential, in my opinion, if you want to learn to play well.
Rating:
Summary: Best beginner's Go book for non-Asians.
Review: If you want to learn to play Go well, this book will tell you what you need to know, in a very readable, enjoyable format. Go requires an East Asian philosophic outlook to be played properly, and the authors understand how to convey the necessary Go knowledge to Westerners. Even if you are an experienced player, you would probably benefit from this book. It covers recent developments in Go theory which older players may not be familiar with. Japanese Go books assume that their audience has an Asian philosophic outlook. This book doesn't. That's why it will enable you (if you were raised in a Western culture) to understand Go from a more Asian viewpoint. This is essential, in my opinion, if you want to learn to play well.
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