Fictional Chess Players
by Bill Wall

Miss Abnether in Whipping Star (1969) by Frank Herbert (1920-1986)

Adam in The Computer That Said Steal Me (1983) by Elizabeth Levy

Peter Affare in The Winnowing (1976) by Isaac Asimov

Captain Allington in Castle Orchard (2014) by E. Dineley

Josiah Amberley in The Adventure of the Retired Colourman (1926) by Arthur Conan Doyle

Johnathan Anders in The Doom Fisherman (1969) by Andrew York

Arnie in Christine (1983) by Stephen King

ANNDY in Hence (1989) by Brad Leithauser

Yuri Asimov in Ghost: Inception: SAS Modern Warfare Book 2 (2015) by Fredrik Hansen

Dr. B in The Royal Game (1941) by Stefan Zweig

Francis Baron in Exchange of Men (1946) by Joseph Cross

Nick Baron in Shadow Maker (2014) by James Hannibal

Roy Batty in Blade Runner (1982)

Eugene Berlin in Master Prim (1968) by James Ellison

Bernard in Tom Clancy's Net Force: Springboard (2005) by Steve Perry and Larry Segriff

Jim Berzchak in The Chess Team (2005) by James Sawaski

Aleksandr Kimovich Bezetov in A Partial History of Lost Causes (2012) by Jennifer DuBois

Edwin Bishop in The Immortal Game (1999) by Mark Coggins

Hugo Bishop in Knight Sinister (1957) by Adam Hall

Rick Blaine in Casablanca (1942)

Bloggs in Noblesse Oblige by J.L, Synge

Edward Bray in The Ballad of Edward Bray (1910) by A.A. Milne

Timothy Briggs in Hence by Brad Leithauser

Sienna Brooks in Inferno (2013) by Dan Brown

Dr. Buagaew in Anarchy and Old Dogs (2007) by Colin Cotterill

Budnick in Don't Quote Me, But.(1946) by Billy Rose

Buzz in The Counterfeit Tackle (1965) by Matt Christopher

Harry Chelm in Beat the Devil by Claude Cockburn

Chicot the Jester in La Dame de Monsoreau (1846) by Alexandre Dumas

Martin Chronister in The Chess Partner by Theododore Mathieson

Emil Clement in The Death's Head Chess Club: A Novel (2015) by John Donoghue

Anna Comnena in Anna of Byzantium (2000) by Tracy Barrett

Robert Delano Coomer in A Naked Singularity (2008) by Sergio De La Pava

Cranko in Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (1974) by John le Carre

Mr. Creech in Striding Folly (1939) by Dorothy Sayers

Mirko Czentovic in The Royal Game (1941) by Stefan Zweig

Damon in April Fool's Day (1993) by Bryce Courtenay

Darcy in 101 Ways to Meet Mr. Right (1985) by Janet Quin-Harkin

Deidre in Deidre (1907) by W.B. Yeats

Father Dempsey in Bishop as Pawn (1994) by William Kienzle

Margot Dennison in Equation of Doom (1957) by Gerald Vance

Dhoya in Dhoya (1891) by W.B. Yeats

Digby in Digby: Chess Professor (1889) by Charles Barns

Doc in The Power of One (1989) by Bryce Courtenay

Duc de Beaufort in Twenty Years After (1845) by Alexxander Dumas

Duke in Sweetland (2015) by Michael Crummey

Mr. Endon in Murphy (1938) by Samuel Beckett

Erlend in Kristin Lavransdatter II: The Wife (1921) by Sigrid Undset

Estaguisco in Boxwood (2002) by Camilo Jose Cela

Esther in Reality Inspector (1982) by John Caris

Walter Faber in Homo Faber. Ein Bericht (1957) by Max Frisch

Jeff Faulkner in The Dragon Variation (1969) by Anthony Glyn

Prince Ferdinand in The Tempest (1610) by William Shakespeare

Freddy Ferguson in Check . and Mate (1946) by Jay Wilson

Fischerle in Auto-da-Fe (1935) by Elias Canetti

Dominic Flandy in Circus of Hells (1970) by Poul Anderson

Douglas Franklin in Four Knights Game (1974) by George Chesbro

Dieter Frisch in The Luneberg Variation (1993) by Paolo Maurensig

Fulke FitzWanin in Outlaw Knight (2013) by Elizabeth Chadwick

John Gabriel in Miss Gabriel's Gambit (2014) by Rita Boucher

Derek Garland in Palace Council (2008) by Stephen Carter

Gaston in Lolita (1955) by Vladimir Nabokov

Geoffrey Gervaise in Celestial Chess (1979) by Thomas Bontly

Mr. Giles in The Tournament (2013) by Matthew Reilly

Rufus Goodspeed in Curiosity (2014) by Gary Blackwood

Tobias Goodspeed in Curiosity (2014) by Gary Blackwood

Gossage in The Gossage-Vardebedian Papers (1966) by Woody Allen

Hertz Grein in Shadows on the Hudson (1967) by Isaac Singer

Grew in Pebble in the Sky (1950) by Isaac Asimov

Forrest Gump in Forrest Gump (1986) by Winston Groom

Walter Hargrave in The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1848) by Anne Bronte

Beth Harmon in The Queen's Gambit (1983) by Walter Tevis

Alexandra Hathaway in Rushed to the Altar (2012) by Jane Feather

J. Hampton Hoogestraten in Slippery Elm (1924) by Percival Wilde

Jacob and Helen Horowitz in The Last Gambit by David Delman

Humbert Humbert in Lolita (1955) by Vladimir Nabokov

George Hunker in Fool's Mate (1951) by Stanley Ellin

Helen Huntingdon in The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1848) by Anne Bronte

Isaac in Accelerated (2013) by Bronwen Hruska

Jackson in Chess Nuts (2010) by Julia Lawrinson

Richard James in Exchange of Men (1946) by Joseph Cross

Waverly Jong in The Joy Luck Club (1989) by Amy Tan

Julie in Checkmate Julie (1974) by Linda Jacobs Altman

Dmitri Kaganovich in The Last Gambit (1991) by David Delman

Naseem Kattan in Shadow Maker (2014) by James Hinnibal

Colonel Bryan Kelly in All the King's Horses (1951) by Kurt Vonnegut

Captain Rufus King in Methuselah's Children (1941) by Robert Heinlein

Henry Knight in A Pair of Blue Eyes (1873) by Thomas Hardy

Nikolai Kotalev in The Kings are Already Here (2003) by Garret Freymann Weyr

Bishop Kowalzki in Bishop as Pawn (1994) by William Kienzle

Tov Kronsteen in From Russia, with Love (1957) by Ian Fleming

Kuppermann in The Poisoned Pawn by Henry Slesar

Ivan Kutsenko in Grandmaster (2005) by Warren Murphy and Molly Cochran

Lalji in The Calorie Man (2005) by Paolo Bacigalupi

Landsman in The Yiddish Policemen's Union (2007) by Michael Chabon

General Lane in Check — and Mate (1946) by Jay Wilson

Lavrans in Kristin Lavransdatter II: The Wife (1921) by Sigrid Undset

LeBeau in Zugzwang (2003) by Michael Griffith

John LeConte in If There Were No Benny Cemoli by Philip K. Dick

Roy Lee in The New Normal (2013) by Ashely Little

Letherby in Pawn to King's Four (1943) by Stephen Leacock

Molly Levaticus in Supertoys Last All Summer Long (2001) by Brian Aldiss

David Levinson in Independence Day (1996)

Andrew Jackson Libby in Methuselah's Children (1941) by Robert Heinlein

Joel Linton in Pawn to King's Four (1943) by Stephen Leacock

Lisa in Lisa: A Chess Novel (2013) by Jesse Kraai

Cicero Lookins in Dissident Gardens (2013) by Jonathan Lethem

Aleksandr Ivanovich Luzhin in The Defense (1930) by Vladimir Nabokov

Samantha Mackin in Samantha's Gambit (2010) by Stephen Carter

Fin Macleod in The Chessmen: The Lewis Trilogy (2015) by Peter May

Magento in the X-Men series

Marian in Marian's Christmas Wish (1989) by Carla Kelly

Philip Marlow in The High Window (1942) by Raymond Chandler

Mr. Mellilow in Striding Folly (1939) by Dorothy Sayers

Miranda in The Tempest (1610) by William Shakespeare

Mort in Mort the Sport (2000) by Robert Krause

Harry Moseby in Night Moves by Alan Sharp

Li Moshreng in The Bus Stop (1981) by Gao Xingjian

Mr. Moxon in Moxon's Master (1893, 1899) by Ambrose Bierce

Murphy in Murphy (1938) by Samuel Beckett

Naoise in Deidre (1907) by W.B. Yeats

Natalya in The Darlings Are Forever (2011) by Melissa Kantor

Niemzo-Zborowski in Slippery Elm (1924) by Percival Wilde

Mrs. Joann Oppenheimer in The Dragon Variation (1969) by Anthony Glyn

Orimund in Exchange of Men (1946) by Joseph Cross

Mikos Pajorfsky in The Giant's Shadow (1988) by Thomas Bontly

John Pardee in The Bishop Murder Case (1928) by S.S. Van Dine

Commander Pebbles in The Chess Players (2010) by Francis Partel

Pena in The Dublin Pawn (1977) by John Keckhut

Ivan Petrokivitch in Forrest Gump (1986) by Winston Groom

Ilya Platonov in Stalin's Ghost (2013) by Martin Cruz Smith

Poliphilo in Hypnerotomachia Poliphili: Strife of Love and Dream (1499) by Francesco Colonna

Frank Poole in 2001: A Space Odyssey

Julian Prim in Master Prim (1968) by James Ellison

Dr. Quermot in The Naked Sun (1957) by Isaac Asimov

Dr. Quies in The Startling Exploits of Dr. J.B. Quies (1886) by Paul Celiere

Mary Rainbow in Reality Inspector (1982) by John Caris

Raphael in 'Petopia,' Asimov's Science Fiction (June 2010) by Benjamin Crowell

Jonathan Rebeck in A Fine and Private Place (1960) by Peter Beagle

Stirf Ritter-Rebil in "Midnight by the Morphy Watch," If (August 1974) by Fritz Leiber

Rensky in Dragon Variation (1975) by George Chesbro

Tamar Robinson in The New Normal (2013) by Ashley Little

Dr. Aaron Rodman in The Winnowing (1976) by Isaac Asimov

Rolavsky in Last Round (1947) by Kester Svenden

Kinna Ronay in The Fleet of Stars (1997) by Poul Anderson

Rozental in Zugzwang (2010) by Roman Bennett

Sam Runner in Reality Inspector (1982) by John Caris

David Rutherford in Miss Gabriel's Gambit (2014) by Rita Boucher

Jack Ryan in the Tom Clancy novels

Jeremiah de Saint-Amour in Love in the Time of Cholera (1985) by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Don Sandalio in The Novel of Don Sandalio by Miguel de Unamuno

Sarah Jane in White Lines on a Green field (2011) by Catherynne Valente

Sarratt in Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (1974) by John le Carre

Savard in Exchange of Men (1946) by Joseph Cross

Dr. Savaronoff in The Big Four (1927) by Agatha Christie

William Schlumberger in Kingkill (1977) by Thomas Gavin

Dr. Schmidt in The Chessplayers (1953) by Charles Harness

Joseph Schwartz in Pebble in the Sky (1950) by Isaac Asimov

Parnell Scott in The Negative Ones (1965) by Lionel Fanthorpe

Mr. Shaibel in The Queen's Gambit (1983) by Walter Tevis

Aleksandr Shashtin in Black Knight, White Queen (2013) by Jackie Ashenden

Sheldrake in Los Voraces 2019 (2004) by Andy Soltis

John Sherman in John Sherman (1891) by W.B. Yeats

Henry Silver in When I was Older (2002) by Garret Freymann-Weyr

Corinna Louise Skye in Tom Clancy's Net Force by Steve Perry

Stephen Smith in A Pair of Blue Eyes (1873) by Thomas Hardy

Smoggs in The Man Who Sidetracked his Brains (1940) by Lord Dunsany

Snogs in Noblesse Oblige by J.L, Synge

Solly in Heart on the Line (2012 ) by Judith Arnold

Stanhope in Darkness Visible (1979) by William Golding

Stavlokratz in The Three Sailor's Gambit (1916) by Lord Dunsany

Gavin Stevens in Knight's Gambit (1949) by William Faulkner

Lowell Stone (Buster) in The Rolling Stones (1952) by Robert Heinlein

Will Stringer in Frenzy (2014) by Robert Lettrick

Maestro Sudeikin in The Twelve Chairs (1928) by Ilya Ilf and Evgeny Petrov

Elfride Swancourt in A Pair of Blue Eyes (1873) by Thomas Hardy

Sweetland in Sweetland (2015) by Michael Crummey

Elias Tarsis in The Tower Struck by Lightning (1991) by Fernando Arrabel

Judge Cass Timberlane in Cass Timberlane by Sinclair Lewis

Timothy in Hence (1989) by Brad Leithauser

Tor in Latecomers (2014) by David Brin

Eldon Tyrell in Blade Runner (1982)

Dr. Juvenal Urbino in Love in the Time of Cholera (1985) by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Vardebedian in The Gossage-Vardebedian Papers (1966) by Woody Allen

Catherine Velis in The Eight (1988) by Katherine Neville

Vivien in Time and the Witch Vivien (1889) by William Yeats

Volodin in Commander in Chief (2015) by Mark Greaney

Von Goom in 'Von Goom's Gambit' (Chess Review, April 1966) by Victor Contoski

Gunther Weil in Griffin's Egg (1992) by Michael Swanwick

Werner in The Seven Who Were Hanged (1908) by Leonid Andreyev

Milar Whitecliff in Fortune's Rising (2014) by Sara King

Gilmore Wilson in The Big Four (1927) by Agatha Christie

Eli Wood in The Fairy Chessmen (1946) by Henry Kuttner

Arden Wylie in The Memory Man (1982) by John Griffiths

Marian Wynswich in Marian's Christmas Wish (1989) by Carla Kelly

Charles Xavier in the X-Men series

Wang Yisheng in The Chess Master (2005) by A Cheng

Yurichenko in The Kingmaker (2011) by Christian Cantrell

Oleg Zaitsev in Red Rabbit (2003) by Tom Clancy

Zeno in "The Chessplayers" (1953) by Charles Harness

Alexander Illyich Zhukovsky (1997) by Tanya Jones

Mr. Zumpin in Like a Bad Dream (1956) by Heinrich Boll


Authors of literature with chess theme:

Agnon, Shmuel Yosef — A Guest for the Night, 1938 ("We play chess and talk politics, and we exhaust every subject.")

Agnon, Shmuel Yosef — A Simple Story, 1935 ("He also resumed his games of chess with Schrenzel.")

Aldiss, Brian — The Canopy of Time, (Faber and Faber 1959)

Aldiss, Brian — Enemies of the System, 2015 ("A row of chessputers sat before a row of three-dimensional chess boards, waiting against any human who cared to challenge them."

Aldiss, Brain — Supertoys Last All Summer Long, 2001 ("Molly was an intellectual lady, played a silver trumpet, spoke seven languages, was a chess champion.")

Aldiss, Brian — The Malacia Tapestry, 1976 ("Don't forget then. I went to see Father last evening and played chess with him."

Alexander, Patrick — Death of a Thin-Skinned Animal, 1976

Allen, Woody — The Gossage-Vardebedian Papers, 1966

Altman, Linda Jacobs — Checkmate Julie, 1974

Anderson, Poul — All One Universe, 1997 ("A more dubious privilege was that of playing chess with the Margrave.")

Anderson, Poul — A Circus of Hells, (Signet, 1970)

Anderson, Poul — My Object All Sublime, 1961 ("He led me to a bar that had little of Chicago about it: quiet, shabby, no jukebox, no television, a bookshelf, and several chess sets, but none of the freaks and phoneys who usually infest such places.")

Anderson, Poul — No World of Their Own, 2015 ("Saris Hronna and Robert Matsumoto were the Explorer's chess friends.")

Anderson, Poul — Operation Luna, 1999

Anderson, Poul — Starfarers, 1998 ("Sundaram and Ruszek played a game of chess in the saloon.")

Anderson, Poul — The Enemy Stars, 1959 ("In moments when there was nothing else to do he might still play a quick chess game with Sverdlov.Even given boats, chess, music, the No Drama, beautiful women and beautiful spectroscopes, life could get heavy.")

Anderson, Poul — The Fleet of Stars, 1997 ("[She] beat him two chess games out of three.")

Anderson, Poul — The Immortal Game, 1954

Anderson, Poul — The Sensitive Man, 2013 ("So Bancroft or Meade played chess — that was something they had in common, at least, on this night of the murder.")

Anderson, Poul — The Unicorn Trade, 1984 ("He was only at ease with his books and his chess and his mineral collection.")

Andreyev, Leonid - The Seven That Were Hanged (1908) ("At the trial, he thought neither of death nor of life — but concentrated his attention deeply and coolly upon a difficult chess game which he was playing.")

Archer, Alex — The Pretender's Gambit, 2014 ("With one small chess piece, the game begins.")

Archer, Alex — The Third Caliph, 2013 ("Perhaps Annja Creed and Thabit did not have all the chess pieces in the game."

Archer, Alex — River of Nightmares, 2014 ("Your wife was the only one who'd play chess with him.")

Archer, Jeffrey — Cat O' Nine Tales: And Other Stories, 2008 ("Elizabeth had no use for the chess set, so Sir James was stuck with it.")

Archer, Jeffrey — The Fourth Estate, 1996 ("We met at a local chess club many years ago, and used to play every Tuesday and Friday.")

Archer, Jeffrey — The Luncheon, 1980 ("I joined Amanda with the bottle and two glasses a few moments later, to find her studying my chess board and fingering the delicate ivory pieces that were set out for a game I was playing by mail."

Archer, Zoe — Chain Reaction, 2012 ("Never been so aroused by chess before.")

Archer, Zoe — Devil's Kiss, 2011 ("Heart pounding, she snatched up one of the chess pieces and tossed it toward the window. The little carved bishop sailed out as if nothing stopped it.")

Archer, Zoe — Sinner's Heart, 2013 ("The shrewd scholar, who preferred long, arid discussions about politics to wine-soaked merriment, who never lost at chess and always held the box for the other Hellraisers at the theatre — that man had vanished.")

Arnold, Judith — A Loverboy, 2014 (His bookshelves held fewer books than playthings — a chess set in which the pieces were modeled on the character illustrations in the original edition of Alice in Wonderland")

Arnold, Judith — Heart on the Line, 2012 ("He wandered into the kitchen to check his answering machine. Just one message: Solly reminding him of their weekly chess date tomorrow at noon — Solly lived for their chess games.")

Arrabal, Fernando - The Tower Struck by Lightning (Prix Nadal 1983)

Asaro, Catherine — Alpha, 2006 ("Decades ago, people had expected that if a computer bested a human chess master, the machine would qualify as intelligent. Deep Blue beat Gary Kasparov, the world champion, few people considered it truly intelligent.")

Asaro, Catherine — Schism, 2010 ("Brad came over to the chess board and gave Shannon a rueful smile. "I guess I can finish losing this game another time.")

Ashenden, Jackie — Black Knight, White Queen, 2013

Ashenden, Jackie — Kidnapped by the Billionaire, 2016 ("She was sick of feeling like a goddamn chess piece, a pawn that other people pushed around on a board for their own ends, playing their own games.")

Asimov, Isaac — Bouquets of the Black Widowers, 1984 ("'Please! It will do you good to listen. You may be a distraction. If you play chess, you will know what I mean when I say you may be a sacrifice. You are sent in to confuse and distract us, occupying our time and efforts, while the real work is done elsewhere.")

Asimov, Isaac — Exile to Hell, 1968 ("He considered the chessboard carefully and his hand hesitated briefly over the bishop. Parkinson, at the other side of the chess board, watched the pattern of the pieces absently. Chess was, of course, the professional game of computer programmers, but, under the circumstances, he lacked enthusiasm. By rights, he felt with some annoyance, Dowling should have been even worse off; he was programming the prosecution's case. He tapped his finger on the chessboard for emphasis, and Dowling caught the queen before it went over. "Adjusting, not moving," he mumbled. Dowling's eyes went from piece to piece and he continued to hesitate.")

Asimov, Isaac — Fantastic Voyage II, 1987 ("In life, unlike chess, the game continues after checkmate.")

Asimov, Isaac — Franchise, 1950 ("We can't let you read a newspaper, but if you'd care for a murder mystery, or if you'd like to play chess, or if there's anything we can do for you to help pass the time, I wish you'd mention it.")

Asimov, Isaac — Legal Rites, 1950 ("Every night we sat up together. When we didn't play pinochle or chess or cribbage, we just sat and talked over the news of the day. I still have the book we used to keep records of the chess and pinochle games. Zeb made the entries himself, in his own handwriting.")

Asimov, Isaac — Man as the Ultimate Gadget, 1988

Asimov, Isaac — Monkey's Finger, 1953 ("Yes. Yes." Torgesson paced faster. "Then you must know that chess-playing computers have been constructed on cybernetic principles. The rules of chess moves and the object of the game are built into its circuits. Given any position on the chess board, the machine can then compute all possible moves together with their consequence and choose that one which offers the highest probability of winning the game. It can even be made to take the temperament of its opponent into account. Torgesson said, "Now imagine a similar situation in which a computing machine can be given a fragment of a literary work to which the computer can then add words from its stock of the entire vocabulary such that the greatest literary values are served. Naturally, the machine would have to be taught the significance of the various keys of a typewriter. Of course, such a computer would have to be much, much more complex than any chess player." )

Asimov, Isaac — Nightfall, 1941 ("The men about the table had brought out a multi-chess board and started a six member game. Moves were made rapidly and in silence. All eyes bent in furious concentration on the board.")

Asimov, Isaac - Pebble in the Sky (Doubleday, 1950) ("Chess, somehow, hadn't changed, except for the names of the pieces..")

Asimov, Isaac — Robot Dreams, 1986 (""Paulson said, "We can't let you read a newspaper, but if you'd care for a murder mystery, or if you'd like to play chess, or if there's anything we can do for you to help pass the time, I wish you'd mention it." "Reason alone wouldn't do. What was needed was a rare type of intuition; the same faculty of mind (only much more intensified) that made a grand master at chess. A mind was needed of the sort that could see through the quadrillions of chess patterns to find the one best move, and do it in a matter of minutes.")

Asimov, Isaac — Second Foundation, 1953 (" "But there was no way of making the people suddenly disbelieve what they had believed all their lives, so that the myth eventually served a very useful purpose in Seldon's cosmic chess game.")

Asimov, Isaac — Take a Match, 1972 ("He said there was a low hum that you could hear in one of the men's rooms that you couldn't hear anymore. And he said there was a place in the closet of the game room where the chess sets were kept where the wall felt warm because of the fusion tube and that place was not warm now.")

Asimov, Isaac — Tales of the Black Widdowers, 1971 ("He was a master at Chinese checkers, Parcheesi, backgammon, Monopoly, checkers, chess, go, three-dimensional ticktacktoe." Do you have a chess set, Mr. Atwood?")

Asimov, Isaac — The Dead Past, 1956 ("Your scientists can't write. Why should they be expected to? They aren't expected to be grand masters at chess or virtuosos at the violin, so why expect them to know how to put words together? Why not leave that for specialists, too?")

Asimov, Isaac — The Naked Sun, 1957 ("As for Dr. Quemot, he played chess with Dr. Delmarre regularly. Perhaps he grew annoyed at losing too many games.")

Asimov, Isaac — The Perfect Fit, 1981

Asimov, Isaac — The Smile of the Chipper, 1988 ("Getting two chippers to work together is impossible. They're like chess grandmasters, I suppose.")

Asimov, Isaac — The Winnowing, 1976 ("Peter Affarre, chairman of the World Food Organization, came frequently to Rodman's laboratories for chess and conversation.")

Asimov, Isaac — Waterclap, 1970 ("At any given time, some fifteen of our men are asleep and perhaps fifteen more are watching films or playing chess or, if their wives are with them--")

Bailey, Len — Clabbernappers, 2005

Bailey, Len — Fantasms, 2007

Bacigalupi, Paolo — The Calorie Man, 2005 ("Neither of them played chess well, and so their games often devolved into a series of trades made in dizzying succession.")

Bacigalupi, Paolo — The Windup Girl, 2009

Bard, Benedict - The Black Queen, 1999 ("I am a man, more or less normal, who has survived a plane crash, has played chess with Leviathans, has seen hell, has captured the Black Queen, has driven in a chariot of fire across the pacific and Asia and is now sitting on the roof of the world...")

Barns, Charles Edward — Digby, Chess Professor (1889) ("Yes, Monsieur Count, I come from a long race of chess-players — from a people who swore by the knights, pawns and castles away back in the classic groves of Arcady, for aught I know.")

Barrett, Tracy — Anna of Byzantium, 1999 ("A new game called chess was wildly popular in the palace.")

Baxter, Stephen — Ark, 2010 ("On the monitor, Zane and Wetherbee spoke quietly, over a game of infinite chess.")

Baxter, Stephen — Coalescent, 2003 (They tried to play ludus latrunculorum — soldiers,' a fast-moving game a little like chess played only with rooks")

Baxter, Stephen — Evolution, 2003 ("One of Papak's most popular innovations was chess. This was a game, he said, recently to amuse the court of Persia.")

Baxter, Stephen — Proxima, 2013 ("It was all complicated, a game of human chess.")

Baxter, Stephen — Ultima, 2014 (I think Earthshine moved us to where he wanted us to be, like chess pieces on a board, Colonel Kalinski.")

Baxter, Stephen and Arthur C. Clarke — The Light of Other Days, 2010 ("I've never been a scientist. But I've solved puzzles. I play chess, for instance. Science is something like that, isn't it? You figure something out — suddenly see how the game fits together")

Beagle, Peter — A Fine and Private Place, 1960 ("I like chess. I am fond of chess. I'm crazy about chess. Let's play some chess.")

Beagle, Peter — Tamsin, 1999 ("Evan would have made a great chess hustler, like the ones in Central park, if he weren't a crazy farmer.")

Bear, Greg — Anvil of Stars, 1992 ("The Brothers discovered chess, and it became a release for them. One entire day, all the Brothers aboard Trojan Horse played chess without easting or sleeping.")

Bear, Greg — Slant, 1997 (Giffey has never met a machine he could not beat, at chess, at war games, at predicting equities weather.")

Bear, Greg — Vitals, 2002 ("It's either read or play chess or get to know each other.")

Becket, Samuel — Murphy, 1938 ("It was the same with chess, Mr. Endon's one frivolity. Murphy would set up the game, as soon as he came on in the morning, in a quiet corner of the wreck, make his move (for he always played white), go away, come back to Mr. Endon's reply, make his second move, go away, and so on throughout the day.")

Becket, Samuel - Endgame (1957)

Beeler, Glen — The Love That Outlasted the Storms, 2011 ("James has learned from playing chess in college and kung fu that he has to be at least two moves ahead of his opponent.")

Bellairs, John — The Chessmen of Doom, 1989

Bellairs, John — The Curse of the Blue Figurine, 1983 (This evening, after dinner, how would you like to come over for a game of chess and a piece of chocolate cake? I play a superlative game of chess.")

Bellow, Saul — The Adventures of Augie March, 1953 ("Grandma Lausch played like Timur, whether chess or klabyasch, with palatal catty harshness and sharp gold in her eyes."

Benioff, David — City of Thieves, 2008 ("You can't love chess and not love Capablanca. But Lasker, nobody's better in the endgame.")

Benioff, David — The 25th Hour, 2002 ("But no hustlers punch their chess clocks today; too early on a winter's morning.")

Benioff, David — Zoanthropy, 2004 ("As soon as I got home I began preparing the house for my father arranging the ivory chess pieces in their proper formations.")

Bennett, Ronan, Zugzwang, 2006 ("There was simply too much at stake. Chess was his life.")

Berenson, Alex — The Wolves, 2016 ("The afternoon ticked by. For an hour or so, they played Durak, a Russian card game. Then they shifted to chess, Nikolai playing Sergei and Buvchenko at once. Sergei's first suggestion was sly, almost offhand. It came after Nikolai had demolished him for the third straight chess match.")

Berman, Ruth — 'A Board in the Other Direction,' The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, 1974

Bernard, Renee — Mystified: The Haunting of Castle Keyvnor, 2016 ("She laughed, for she'd always defeated him at chess. He was the more logical player, yes, but he'd been hampered by his inability to take big chances."

Bernard, Renee — Obsession Wears Opals, 2012 ("Chess was a serious game but Darius had never played it without folding in a bit of drama.")

Bernard, Renee — Passion Wears Pearls, 2012 ("Conversation with Josiah Hastings was like playing a thrilling game of chess.")

Beverley, Jo — Christmas Angel, 2013 ("He came back with chess men and news, apparently restored to good humor.")

Beverley, Jo — The Christmas Wedding Gambit, 2005 ("He considered the chessboard of his life and made a move."

Beverley, Jo — The Last Chance Christmas Ball, 2016 ("Centered on the inlaid pearwood was an antique chess set carved out of ebony and ivory. "You still play?" "Yes, I have been practicing. But likely I am still not able to beat you." Drawing in a deep breath, he thought for a moment. Chess was all about strategy.")

Bierce, Ambrose - Moxon's Master, 1893 and 1899 (Two or three times after moving a piece the stranger slightly inclined his head, and each time I observed that Moxon shifted his king. All at once the thought came to me that the man was dumb. And then that he was a machine — an automaton chess-player!")

Birch, David - The King's Chessboard, 1988

Bjornson, Bjorstjerne — In God's Way, 1889 (They were to live next door to each other and play chess together.")

Bjornson, Bjorstjerne — Magnhild, 1877 ("There was chess-playing in the daytime and cards in the evening")

Bjornson, Bjorstjerne — Paul Lange and Tora Parsberg, 1899 ("They are merely the pieces in a game of chess")

Bjornson, Bjorstjerne — The Fisher Maiden, 1868 ("He was fond of social games, played chess")

Black, Veronica — Portrait of Sarah, 1969

Blackman, Malorie — Checkmate (Noughts & Crosses, #3), 2001

Blackwood, Gary — Curiosity, 2014 ("Tobias Goodspeed was in charge of a small but prosperous parish in Philadelphia. Since his duties weren't very demanding, he had plenty of leisure time to indulge his two main passions — natural science and chess.")

Blackwood, Grant — Duty and Honor (Tom Clancy — a Jack Ryan Jr novel), 2016 — ("At some point you had to stop the recursive thinking and make a choice. For someone like Jack, who was blessed or cursed with a fertile imagination, this was often challenging. It wasn't unlike chess, a game he both loved and hated.")

Bland, Mark — Knights, Castles & Kings, 2012

Bland, Mark - The Four Chessmen, 2001

Bochak, John - The Gamemaster, 1995

Bogdan, D. L. — The Forgotten Queen, 2013 ("We were playing chess and she was losing on purpose.")

Bogdan, D. L. — The Sumerton Women, 2012 ("The king has broken from Rome. Lord Hal cried one evening as he burst into the solar where Father Alec had been engaging Mirabella in a game of chess.")

Böll, Heinrich — Like a Bad Dream, 1956 ("But how did you know he wasn't there? Because I know he is at the Gaffel Club playing chess, as he does every Wednesday evening at this time.")

Böll, Heinrich — The Clown, 1963 ("I even managed to get Marie, who prefers chess, addicted to this game [Parcheesi].")

Bontly, Thomas — Celestial Chess, 1979

Bontly, Thomas — The Giant's Shadow, 1988

Borges, Jorge Luis — El jardin de senderis que se bifurcan (The Gardens of Forking Paths), 1941 ("In a riddle whose answer is chess, what is the only prohibited word? I thought for a moment and replied, The word chess.")

Borges, Jorge Luis — Ajedrez (Chess), 1974

Boucher, Rita - Miss Gabriel's Gambit, 1993 ("In chess, moves are set, rules determined, but women? They are making rules as they go and changing them in mid-game. The fair sex is incapable of logic. Emotion rules the day. That is why I believe that women are unsuited to games like chess where reason is all.")

Bradbury, Ray  — A Graveyard of Lunatics, 1990 ("What kind of game is this? I ask. I can only find out by countermoving the chesspieces, yes?")

Bradbury, Ray  — A Sound of Thunder, 1952 ("What sort of world it was now, there was no telling. He could feel them moving there, beyond the walls, almost, like so many chess pieces blown in a dry wind ....")

Bradbury, Ray  — All on a Summer's Night, 1950

Bradbury, Ray  - Dandelion Wine, 1957 ("There sat Saul and Marshall, playing chess at the coffee table.")

Bradbury, Ray  - Death is a Lonely Business, 1985 ("...a lovely chess game carved and set in a store window when you were a kid.")

Bradbury, Ray  — Fahrenheit 451, 1953 (" With an effort, Montag reminded himself again that this was no fictional episode to be watched on his run to the river; it was in actuality his own chess-game he was witnessing, move by move.")

Bradbury, Ray  — Farewell Summer, 2006 ("No chess game was ever won by the player who sat for a lifetime thinking over his next move.")

Bradbury, Ray  — The Illustrated Man, 1951 ("flaps of his sliced skin were pinned to the table while hands shifted parts of his body like a quick and curious player of chess, using the red pawns and the red pieces.")

Bradbury, Ray — The Martian Chronicles, 1950 ("He looked at the towers of the little clean Martian village, like sharply carved chess pieces lying in the afternoon."

Braine, Sheila — The Turkish Automaton, 1899

Brin, David — Latecomers, 2014 ("Tor's last partner — a nice old bot and a good chess player — had warned her, when he trans-retired, not to hire an adolescent Class-AAA android fresh out of AI-college.")

Brin, David — Startide Rising, 2010 ("And dolphins didn't play chess worth a damn.")

Brin, David — The Postman, 2011 ("That night Gordon dreamed he was watching Benjamin Franklin play chess with a boxy iron stove.")

Bronte, Anne — The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, 1848 ("But chess-players are so unsociable they are no company for any but themselves.")

Brown, Dan — Inferno, 2014 ("Among this five-year-old's hobbies were violin, chess, biology, and chemistry at the age of four, she had beat a chess grand master at his own game and was reading in three languages.")

Brown, Dan — The Da Vinci Code, 2003 ("The men wore long black tunics, and their masks were black. They looked like pieces in a giant chess set.")

Brown, Fredric — Come and Go Mad, 1949 ("Charlie, ever hear of chessment coming in red or black? I've been dreaming the same things over and over. One of them is something about a game between the red and the black; I don't even know whether it is chess.

Brown, Fredric — Recessional, 1961 ("Our Rook, he who was on the Queen's side of the field in the Beginning, swoops toward the evil Black King, our enemy. The villainous one is under attacj — and cannot escape. We have won! We have won! A voice in the sky says calmly, "Checkmate.")

Brown, Fredric — The Laughing Butcher, 1948 ("She plays chess with dwarfs on your honeymoon?")

Brown, Fredric — The Lights in the Sky are Stars, 1953 ("One evening a week, usually Sunday, I spent at Klocky's place, playing chess, drinking a little beer, talking.")

Brown, Fredric — The Waveries, 1945 ("And there's the chess-and-checker club.")

Brown, Tameka — Around Our Way on Neighbors' Day, 2010 (Wave to Raven working on her Mural way up high. Mr. O and Mr. Wong Playing chess the whole day.")

Brunner, John - The Squares of the City, 1965

Buck, Pearl — The Eternal Wonder, 1973 ("Upon a chess table made in Korea, his grandfather kept set in position a great set of chessmen carved in white and black marble. His grandfather was a superb chess player, and though his own father had taught him the game, he had yet to win over his grandfather.")

Buckley, Fiona — Queen's Ransom, 2008 ("Her Ladies of the Bedchamber sometimes look exhausted, after being awakened in the small hours to read to their restless sovereign, or worse still, play chess with her.")

Buckley, Fiona — The Fugitive Queen, 2001 ("He was also a decent, honest man, interested in chess and gardens, and uncomplicated Protestant, and a trustworthy subject of the queen.")

Burke, Jonathan — Chessboard, 1953

Burke, Jonathan — Pattern of Shadows, 1954 ("It was like a detached consideration of a game of chess.")

Burke, Jonathan — Pursuit through Time, 1956 ("Cheating was impossible in chess. Every move's potentialities could be estimated by the opponent. There was nothing up the sleeve, nothing held out of sight.")

Burroughs, Edgar Rice - The Chessmen of Mars, 1922

Burton, Jeffrey — The Chessmen, 2012

Burton, Richard — Arabian Nights, 1885 ("And he fell to moving no piece, save after calculation, and ceased not to play, till she said, "Thy King is dead! — Checkmate.")

Byron, Henry James — Our Boys, Act 1, 1875, ("Life's too short for chess.")

Calvino, Italo — Invisible Cities, 1972 ("Kublai was a keen chess player. If each city is like a game of chess, the day when I have learned the rules, I shall finally possess my empire, even if I shall never succeed in knowing all the cities it contains.")

Campbell, Nenia — Fearscape, 2012

Canetti, Elias - Auto-da-Fe, 1935

Cantrell, Christian — Kingmaker, 2012

Caris, John - Reality Inspector, 1982 ("Esther took a stool at the bar and excitedly began talking about the world championship chess match which would start in a couple of days.")

Carrol, Lewis - Through the Looking Glass, 1872 ("I declare it's marked out just like a large chess-board. It's like a great huge game of chess that's being played.")

Carter, Stephen — Back Channel, 2014 ("Her boyfriend was teaching her to play chess, the essay explained, and she wanted to go to Varna, the Bulgarian one, to watch the Chess Olympiad, where several dozen countries would send squads of four players each to battle over the course of a month for gold and silver medals.")

Carter, Stephen - The Emperor of Ocean Park, 2002 ("the Judge insisted that the only true artist was the composer.")

Carter, Stephen — Palace Council, 2008 ("He had been the many-time chess champion of the Metropolitan.").

Carter, Stephen L. — Samantha's Gambit

Cela, Camilo Jose — Boxwood, 2002 ("Estaguisco is a chess player of some note, nobody in the area can beat him even though he pawns a rook.")

Cela, Camilo Jose — Mazurka for Two Dead Men, 1983 ("The Casandulfe Raimundo plays chess with Robin Lebozan, he always beats him.")

Cela, Camilo Jose — The Hive, 1951 ("After lunch Don Pablo goes to a quiet cafe on the Calle de San Bernardo to have his game of chess with Don Francisco Robles y Lopez-Paton")

Celiere, Paul — The Startling Exploits of Dr. J. B. Quies, 1886 ("The world might fall into ruins around the Cafe de la Regence, where the chess-players congregate, and not one of them would seem to be aware of the occurrence.")

Chabon, Michael — The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, 2012 ("He had been up, as every morning, since before dawn, settling on a move in one of the chess games he played by mail with men in Cincinnati, Fresno, and Zagreb.")

Chabon, Michael — The Yiddish Policemen's Union, 2007 ("He has been sandbagged by a vision of sitting in the grimy lounge of the Hotel Zamenhof playing chess with Emanuel Lasker, or whatever his real name was. A friendship across sectarian lines is not a common phenomenon, in his experience. In the past, it has struck him that, apart from homosexuals, only chess players have found a reliable way to bridge, intensely but without fatal violence, the gulf that separates any given pair of men.")

Chabon, Michael — Werewolves in Their Youth, 2011 ("On his departure from our house, my father had taken only a plaid valise full of summer clothing and my grandfather's Russian chess set, whose black pieces had once been fingered by Alexander Alekhine.")

Chadwick, Elizabeth — Lords of the White Castle, 2000 ("One day soon you must have lands settled upon you, but how can I give you the responsibilities of a ruler when you cannot even play a game of chess without squabbling?")

Chadwick, Elizabeth — The Summer Queen, 2014 ("They had reached a stalemate in their game of chess.")

Chadwick, Elizabeth — The Outlaw Knight, 2013

Chadwick, Elizabeth — The Winter Crown, 2015 ("She gestured to the chess box. "Perhaps you will play with me now to honor your grandmother. I think she will approve."")

Chambers, Veronica — Miss Black America, 2007 ("If the game is so important, why do we play checkers with this chess set? If we're so smart, why don't we play chess?")

Chandler, Raymond — The High Window, 1942 ("It was night. I went home and put my old house clothes on and set the chessmen out and mixed a drink and played over another Capablanca. It went 59 moves. Beautiful cold remorseless chess, almost creepy in its silent implacability.")

Chandler, Raymond — The Lady in the Lake, 1943 ("I'm a licensed private investigator and have been for quite I like liquor and women and chess and a few other things.")

Chandler, Raymond — The Long Goodbye, 1953 ("She hung up and I set out the chess board. I filled a pipe, paraded the chessmen and inspected them for French shaves and loose buttons, and played a championship tournament game between Gortchakoff and Meninkin, 72 moves to a draw, a prize specimen of the irresistible force meeting the immovable object, a battle without armor, a war without blood, and as elaborate a waste of human intelligence as you could find anywhere outside an advertising agency."

Chandler, Raymond — The Big Sleep, 1939 ("I play over tournament games that have been recorded and published. There's a whole literature about chess. Once in a while I work out problems. They're not chess properly speaking.")

Chang, Shi-kuo — Qi Wang (Chess King), 1975

Chaucer, Geoffrey — 'Book of the Duchess,' The Canterbury Tales, 1400

Cherryh, C. J. — Protector, 2013 ("And there was just nothing to do but play chess with Antaro with everybody else to advise both sides, which made a rowdy sort of chess game.:)

Cherryh, C. J. — Rimrunners, 1989 ("Chess set. Real one, not just a sim. Real board, real pieces. God knew how old.")

Cherryh, C. J. — Visitor, 2016 ("Such faces. There has been far too much study, too much chess, too little noise."

Chesbro, George — Bleeding in the Eye of a Brainstorm, 1995 ("In New York City, if you are a chess player, you need never lack for reasonably respectable, like-minded souls at any hour of any day of the year if you know where to look, and so I headed for the Manhattan Chess Club in their new digs in a renovated four-story brownstone on West 46th Street")

Chesbro, George — Broken Pattern, 1972 ("You see, they've mapped out their whole lives, their goals, like a chess problem, and they're the only major pieces on the board.")

Chesbro, George — Four Knights Game, 1974 ("Giving a simultaneous chess exhibition against 50 players was nothing new for Douglas Franklin. A prodigy as a child, and International Grandmaster at 18, Douglas had spent the last 10 of his 29 years wringing out a living doing what he loved best: playing chess.")

Chesbro, George — The Dragon Variation, 1975 ("There were a dozen chess sets around the room. Beside each was a small pile of postcards, identifying Rensky as a postal chess player.")

Chesbro, George - King's Gambit, 1976 ("Check. For a moment the young boy didn't think his burly opponent had heard him. Then Gligoric's cold grey eyes blinked and focused on his. 'Check, mister,' the boy repeated.")

Chess, Yamie — The Math King of Dallas, 2015 ("I don't even want to finish our chess puzzle until we've helped poor Morphy," Kimi told Tigermore, the light king, who was on square c1, and had already castled on the queenside.")

Christie, Agatha - The Big Four, 1927 ("I saw a mention of it. Dr. Savaronoff, the Russian champion, was one of the players, and the other, who succumbed to heart failure, was the brilliant young American, Gilmour Wilson. Quite right. Savaronoff beat Rubinstein and became Russian champion some years ago. Wilson is said to be a second Capablanca.")

Christopher, Matt — Soccer Duel, 2008 ("Soccer is exactly like chess — well sort of. What do you mean, it's like chess? Norm retorted. I'm outraged. That is a total insult to the thousands of grand masters over thousands of years whose collective wisdom goes into every move Kasparov makes!")

Christopher, Matt — The Counterfeit Tackle, 1965 ("Buzz would rather swim and fish. And play chess. He was the school chess champion last year. That was a game he really liked.")

Clancy, Tom — Clear and Present Danger, 1989 (Murdock nodded. 'I know he's tight with Father Tim over at Georgetown. He was just at the hospital for some chess last night. The Admiral took him in forty-eight moves. You ever play chess with him?'")

Clancy, Tom and Grant Blackwood — Command Authority, 2013

Clancy, Tom — Dead or Alive, 2010 ("[Jack Ryan] learned to shoot from Secret Service agents, had played chess against the Secretary of State")

Clancy, Tom — Executive Orders, 1996 ("One problem with chess, as with life, was that the next move could sometimes be seen, especially when the other player was skilled — to assume him to be anything else could be dangerous. But by playing ahead, it was far more difficult to see what was coming, until the very end, at which point the opponent could see clearly but, maneuvered out of position, depleted of his players, power, and options, he had no choice but to resign the game.")

Clancy, Tom and Steve Pieczenik (written by Diane Duane) — Net Force: Death Match, 2003 (And then Catie was completely surrounded by chess pieces twenty feet tall, so that she couldn't stir to right or left, hemmed in as she was by chocolate-brown rooks and knights and bishops.")

Clancy, Tom — Net Force: Point of Impact, 2001

Clancy, Tom & Steve Pieczenik — OP Center Series, Volume 1, OP CENTER, 1995

Clancy, Tom & Steve Pieczenik — OP Center Series, Volume 2, Mirror Image, 1995

Clancy, Tom & Steve Pieczenik — OP Center Series, Volume 3, Games of State, 199

5 Clancy, Tom — Power Play, 2012 ("I'm talking about the person moving the chess pieces.")

Clancy, Tom — Red Rabbit, 2002 ("He played a particularly fine game of chess and that, he supposed, was where his trained memory came from, all that study of the games of the old grandmasters, so that in a given situation he'd know the next move. He'd actually thought of making chess his career, but though he'd studied hard, it wasn't quite hard enough, it seemed."

Clancy, Tom — The Bear and the Dragon, 2000 ("Since it was a park bench, people sat on it regularly. Adults reading papers, children reading comic books, teenagers holding hands, people chatting amiably, even two elderly men who met every afternoon for a game of chess played on a small magnetic board.")

Clancy, Tom — The Cardinal of the Kremlin, 1988 ("The astronomy and chess clubs are very active. 'Ah. It has been time since I played chess seriously. How tough is the competition?' the Colonel asked.")

Clancy, Tom — The Hunt for Red October, 1984 ("Ryan followed the two admirals out of the room. He spent two hours watching Painter move ships around the ocean like a chess master with is pieces.")

Clancy, Tom — The Sum of All Fears, 1991 ("Such a game this is! Ship against ship, mind against mind. Chess in three dimensions, played in an ever-changing physical environment. And the Americans were the masters of the game.")

Clancy, Tom — The Teeth of the Tiger, 2003 ("The idea is to move logically — from our point of view, but to an outsider it should appear random. It's simple enough in concept, but more difficult in the practical world. It was a lot easier to move chess pieces around a board than in was to manage people to move, on command, to the squares desired, a fact often lost on movie directors.") Clancy, Tom and Steve Pleczenlk — Tom Clancy's Net Force: Virtual Vandals, 1999 ("As Matt stretched out his holoform hand, a small chess piece popped into existence on his palm. It was a pawn, maybe an inch tall, made of swirling red fire.")

Clancy, Tom — Without Remorse, 1993 (" a chess game played in three dimensions, over and under Mach-1, with him driving his two-seater.")

Clarke, Arthur C. — 2001, A Space Odyssey, 1968 ("For relaxation he could always engage Hal in a large number of semimathematical games, including checkers, chess and polyominoes.")

Clarke, Arthur C. -  Armaments Race, 1954 ("I wondered what the trouble was. Not un-American activities again, I prayed: that would trigger off our pet communist, who at the moment was peaceably studying a chess-board in the corner.")

Clarke, Arthur C. — 'Before Eden,' Amazing, June 1961 (" someone has to stay here to keep contact with the ship. How do we settle it this time — chess or cards? Chess takes too long, said Hutchins, especially when you two play it.")

Clarke, Arthur C. — 'Cosmic Casanova,' Venture 1958 ("What's the matter, Joe?' Max would say plaintively. ' Surely you're not mad at me because I beat you at chess again? Remember, I warned you I would.'")

Clarke, Arthur C. — 'Hide and Seek,' Astounding Science-Fiction, September 1949 ("There were rather more men on the chess-board now, and the game was a little deadlier, but his was still the advantage.")

Clarke, Arthur C. — 'Invention (Patent Pending),' Adventure, November 1954 ("Though chess is rampant, darts and shove-ha'penny also flourish.")

Clarke, Arthur C. — 'Quarantine,' Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine, Spring 1977 ("if those six operators are ever re-discovered, all rational computing will end. How can they be recognized?...Here they are: King, Queen, Bishop, Knight, Rook, Pawn.")

Clarke, Arthur C. (Charles Willis) — 'Silence Please!' Science-Fantasy, Winter 1950 ("I take it, of course, that you all understand the phenomenon of interference. 'Hey!' said one of the chess-players, who had given up trying to concentrate on the game (probably because he is losing).'I don't.'")

Clarke, Arthur C. — 'The Other Side of the Sky,' Infinity Fiction Magazine, October 1957 ("On the way up from earth was an inflatable lounge spacious enough to hold no fewer than eight people, a microfilm library, a magnetic billiard table, lightweight chess sets, and similar novelties for bored spacemen.")

Clarke, Arthur C. — 'The Road to the Sea (Seeker of the Spinx),' Two Complete Science-Adventure Books, Spring 1951 ("If he could win Yradne in the present, the future could take care of itself. Why don't you play a game of chess, like sensible people, to decide who'll have her first.")

Clarke, Arthur C. — 'How We Went to Mars,' Amateur Science Fiction Stories, March 1938 ("After this we were not bothered any more and were able to spend most of our time indoors playing poker and some curious Martian games we had picked up, including an interesting mathematical one which I can best describe as 'four-dimensional chess.'")

Cochran, Molly and Warren Murphy (Dev Stryker) — Grandmaster, 1994 ("The chess player, Ivan Kutsenko, was waiting in the dirty little cafe off Gorky Street. He was the chess champion of the world, famed for the subtle, far-reaching brilliance of his play and his total nervelessness at the chessboard.")

Cochran, Molly, Warren Murphy, and James Hetley — Spellbinders, 2014, ("She glared at him with her teeth bared. Chess was not a game. Chess was war. Chess was domination. Chess was a battle of wills in which your opponent must be destroyed — not just defeated, but destroyed. Chess was life.")

Codrescu, Andrei — The Posthuman Dada Guide, 2009 ("Nothing illustrates better the difference between the human and the posthuman than a chess game that took place in October 1916 at the Cafe de La Terrasse in Zurich, Switzerland, between Tristan "all thought is formed in the mouth" Tzara, the daddy of Dada, and V.I. ("communism = socialism + electricity) Lenin, the daddy of Communism.")

Coggins, Mark - The Immortal Game, 1999 ("My chief interest is computer games — computer chess being my specialty.")

Colonna, Francesco — Hypnerotomachia Poliphili: Strife of Love in a Dream, 1499

Contoski, Victor — 'Von Goom's Gambit,' Chess Review, April 1966 ("By this time, Von Goom had become familiar, almost comic, figure in the chess world.Fifteen minutes after the first round began, Von Goom won his first game of chess. His opponent had died of a heart attack.")

Cook, Glen — Lord of the Silent Kingdom, 2007 ("Anna and Pinkus played chess while Pella stumbled through his reading.")

Cook, Glen — The White Rose, 1990 ("He made no new friends. Rumor said he did share the occasional private chess game with the Monitor, Colonel Sweet, for whom he had done some special small services.")

Cotterill, Colin — Anarchy and Old Dogs, 2007 ("It's an old-fashioned game of chess. It's very complicated. My husband did try to teach it to me once but I have no head for such trivia complications. Dr. Buagaew loved the game but he didn't have anyone to play with in this rustic place. So, for a number of years, he maintained a long-distance chess-playing relationship with an old friend of his from school.")

Cotterill, Colin — Curse of the Pogo Stick, 2011 ("Luang Prabang seemed half a planet away. As there was no pocket chess or solitaire to while away the nonmoving hours, Siri had removed the plugs from his ears and was having sport with his judge.")

Cotterill, Colin — Disco for the Departed, 2006 ("The captain looked harshly into his eyes. Siri was that this was no longer the laughing man with whom he'd played chess deep in nameless jungles.") Couperus, Louis - Het zwevende schaakbord (The Floating Chessboard), 1922

Couperus, Louis — The Inevitable, 1900 ("Urania said that the old prince never appeared except at dinner, but that she always looked him up in the morning and sat talking to him for an hour or playing chess with him. At other times he played chess with the chaplain.")

Courtenay, Bryce — April Fool's Day, 1993 ("Chess had always been Damon's way of getting even with is more active friends. He was a very good player in a houseful of pretty good players, the best after Damon being Sam, who lusted after Damon's chess scalp and who was good enough to win an occasional game.")

Courtenay, Bryce — Sylvia, 2006 ("How does a Jew play chess with a Gentile?... Frau Sarah says chess be the game of life.")

Courtenay, Bryce - The Power of One, 1989 ("Like me, Miss Bornstein had never managed to beat Doc at chess.")

Courtenay, Bryce — The Story of Danny Dunn, Volume 1, 2009 ("He soon became known as a swot and, while he wasn't exactly a sissy, he was the next best thing — good at chess and debating, and hopeless at sport.") Crowell, Benjamin — 'Petopia,' Asimov's Science Fiction, June 2010 ("Was he a professional chess hustler now?")

Crummey, Michael — 'Heartburn' Flesh and Blood, 2010 ("Everett comes back with his fists crowded with glasses. He sits them on the tabletop and slides them like chess pieces to the circle of chairs.")

Crummey, Michael — Sweetland, 2015 ("The Reverend glanced down at the chess board. He never participated in a game, but he liked to watch its progress, offering advice and suggestions.")

De Vet, Charles and Katherine MacLean — Second Game (Cosmic Checkmate), 1958 and 1962 ("'I'll beat you the second game,' was the Earthman's challenge to the planet Velda — whose culture was indeed based on a complicated super-chess of skill and concentration.")

Delman, David - The Last Gambit, 1991

Devroe, Hans - Het schaakspel van Leuvren (The Chess Game of Leuven), 1987

Dineley, E. A. — Castle Orchard, 2014 ("Allington will play piquet, chess, backgammon, draughts, but chess is his game. It would be difficult to cheat at that.")

Diver, Lucienne — Vamped, 2009 ("My hot new boyfriend bobby went from chess dud to vamp stud.")

Doyle, Arthur Conan — The Adventure of a Retired Colourman ("Amberley excelled at chess — one mark, Watson, of a scheming mind.")

Duane, Diane — Net Force: Death Match, 2003 ("And then Catie was completely surrounded by chess pieces twenty feet tall, so that she couldn't stir to right or left, hemmed in as she was by chocolate-brown rooks and knights and bishops.")

DuBois, Jennifer — A Partial History of Lost Causes, 2012 ("Years later, after Aleksandr stopped playing chess and started playing politics, the city would become something altogether different. Eventually, chess became something different also — once Aleksandr became world champion and his brilliance was remarked upon so often that it became tedious.")

Duerrenmatt, Friedrich - Der Schachspieler, 2007

Duerrenmatt, Friedrich - The Theatre Director ("as in a chess game, we perceived the move that would destroy us only after it had been made, too late.")

Dumas, Alexandre — Acte, 1838 ("It was not uncommon for Richelieu and Louis XIII to dispute over their evening game of chess upon the merits of their servents.")

Dumas, Alexandre — Chicot the Jester: La Dame de Monsoreau, 1845 ("you must know, M. Aurilly, that at chess the king is a very insignificant person, who has no will, who can only go one step forward or back, or one to the right or left, while he is surrounded by enemies, by knights who jump three squares at a time, by a crowd of pawns who surround him, so that if he badly counseled he is a ruined king in no time, ma foi.")

Dumas, Alexandre — The Three Musketeers, 1844 ("Over their evening game of chess, Richelieu and Louis XIII would frequently debate their servants' merits.")

Dumas, Alexandre - Twenty Years After, 1845 ("Five minutes afterward the officer entered and the duke seemed to be immersed in the sublime combinations of chess. So the duke had more than enough to think about; accordingly he fared at chess as he had fared at tennis; he made blunder upon blunder and the officer with whom he played found him easy game.")

Dunnett, Dorothy — Caprice and Rondo, 1997 ("Abdan Khan, dispatched yesterday to taste the fruits of defeat with his chessboard, was still in the room. He was not awake, nor yet in bed, having apparently fallen asleep on the floor, while playing a stiff game of chess.")

Dunnett, Dorothy — Checkmate, 1975 ("Beside him, on a low table stood a chess set she remembered. The heavy pieces of rock crystal and silver stood, darkly glimmering below the light of the window, and the fire, seeking them, had placed within each small tongue of living flame.")

Dunnett, Dorothy — Niccolo Rising, 1986 ("Two men playing chess on a balcony looked down as an orange rose by their ears and descended.")

Dunnett, Dorothy - Pawn in Frankincense, 1969 ("I propose you a game of live chess. You will return to your cells. When you come back, you will find this room your chessboard. You will direct your pieces and each play the part of your own King.")

Dunnett, Dorothy — Queens' Play, 1964 ("O'LiamRoe found Oonagh at her friends' house, riding, hawking, playing chess with her suitors, and attached himself, jocular and uncomplaining, to their number.")

Dunnett, Dorothy — The Game of Kings, 1962 ("'The Master of Maxwell,' said Lymond, 'is an important personage entirely surrounded by English. D'you play chess?' Scott, knowing him less than sober, was unstartled. He nodded. 'Then you should recognize an opening for smothered mate.'")

Dunnett, Dorothy — The Ringed Castle, 1971 ("I sent for you because I wish to play chess. Come! You refused once to play chess with your sovereign lord. I remember it. You refused several times. An illness, you claimed. A mishap. A battle.")

Dunsany, Lord (Edward Plunkett) — 'Jorkens's Problem,' CHESS, January 1949

Dunsany, Lord (Edward Plunkett) — 'Silence. And Silence still,' British Chess Magazine, Jan-Feb 1951

Dunsany, Lord (Edward Plunkett) — 'The Eccentric Game of Chess,' CHESS, January 1943

Dunsany, Lord (Edward Plunkett) — 'The New Master,' The Little Tales of Smethers and Other Stories, 1952

Dunsany, Lord (Edward Plunkett) - The Man Who Sidetracked His Brains, 1940

Dunsany, Lord (Edward Plunkett) — 'Three Sailor's Gambit,' The Last Book of Wonders, 1916

Dunsany, Lord (Edward Plunkett) — 'Where is it?' CHESS, June 1943

Eliot, George — Adam Bede, 1859 ("Mr Irwine would not have been in the dining-room playing at chess with his mother, and he loves both is mother and chess quite well enough to pass some cloudy hours very easily by their help.")

Eliot, George — Felix Holt, the Radical, 1866 ("Fancy what a game at chess would be if all the chessmen had passions and intellects, more or less small and cunning; if you were not only uncertain about your adversary's men, but a little uncertain also about your own; if your knight could shuffle himself on to a new square by the sly; if your bishop, in disgust at your castling, could wheedle your pawns out of their places; and if your pawns, hating you because they are pawns, could make away from their appointed posts that you might get checkmate on a sudden. You might be the longest-headed of deducted reasoners, and yet you might be beaten by your own pawns. You would be especially likely to be beaten, if you depended arrogantly on your mathematical imagination, and regarded your passionate pieces with contempt. Yet this imaginary chess is easy compared with the game a man has to play against his fellow-men with other fellow-men for his instruments. He thinks himself sagacious, perhaps, because he trusts no bond except that of self-interest; but the only self-interest he can safely rely on is what seems to be such to the mind he would use or govern. Can he ever be sure of knowing this?")

Eliot, T.S. — 'A Game of Chess' in The Waste Land, 1922 (And we shall play a game of chess, Pressing lidless eyes and waiting for a knock upon the door.")

Ellison, James Whitfield — Master Prim, 1968

Elyot, Thomas — The Book Named the Governour, 1531 ("Chess, of all games wherein is no bodily exercise, is most to be commended, for therein is right subtle ingenuity, whereby the wit is made more sharp and remembrance quickened. And it is the more commendable and also commodious, if the players have read the moralization of chess; and whey they play do think upon it.")

Evans, Zoe — Confessions of a Wannabe Cheerleader, 2011 ("I understand that we are a little bit cheer challenged (ok, fina, a lot), but c'mon. Chess? Chess is a silent game! What are we supposed to do to cheer on chess!?! Mime?")

Evans, Zoe — Revenge of the Titan, 2012 ("Lately we'd still just had Grizzly-type games to cheer at (think math league, chess league, debate team, and now, bowling league").

Falco, Edward — "Smothered Mate" in Masters of Technique, 2010

Falco, Edward — The Match, 2005 ("He check the bag's contents, riffling through tubes of glue and make-up, a vinyl chess board, Staunton chess pieces, and a thin make-up instruction book that he didn't really need since the techniques were simple and he had pretty much memorized the book anyway.")

Fanthorpe, Lionel — Beyond the Void, 1965 ("Remember the chess match? Yes. Pawn to king four. She sighed. Pawn to king four, she echoed.")

Fanthorpe, Lionel (John E, Muller) — Forbidden Planet, 1961 ("...men are perfect pawns, in this cosmic, galactic chess game. Then let us take the next strongest piece. On a chess-board the pawn is given the value of 1.")

Fanthorpe, Lionel — Hand of Doom, 1960 ("The chess expert uses his knight on the closely packed confines of an opening game. It is at the end, on an open board, that the rooks and the bishops can do their finest work.")

Fanthorpe, Lionel — Phenomena X, 1966 ("I saw two of them playing what looked like a kind of four dimensional chess. Oh, yes? Well — three dimensional, anyway.")

Fanthorpe, Lionel — The Negative Ones, 1965 ("Centuries before, chess had been played to those rules, as far as he knew, but certainly hundreds of years had passed since the introduction of the pawn moves two innovation. Scott was a psychiatrist first, and a chess player second.")

Farber, Erica - Kiss of the Mermaid, 1996

Faulkner, William - Knight's Gambit, 1949 ("I mean friends in the sense that two men who play chess together are friends, even though sometimes their aims are diametrically opposed. 'Nothing by which all human passion and hope and folly can be mirrored and then proved, ever was just a game,' his uncle said. 'Move.'")

Feather, Jane — Rushed to the Altar, 2012 ("What shall it be gentlemen? Bassett, piquet, backgammon?" 'Chess,' Peregrine said suddenly. 'Mistress Hathaway, I challenge you.' He bowed. Despite her earlier perturbation, Alexandra felt a rush of excitement. Chess as her game. She played a good game of piquet, but she excelled at chess.")

Feather, Jane — The Diamond Slipper, 1997 ("Cordelia shook her head, her cheeks still pink. 'It's not really possible to cheat at chess, but I do so hate to lose. I can't seem to help it.")

Feather, Jane — The Least Likely Bride, 2000 ("The ship's master had an intellectual mind, it seemed. She looked at the chessboard set out on a small table under the window. It looked as if he was in the middle of a game, unless it was a chess problem he was working on. Olivia bent over the pieces, frowning. She moved the white bishop to king four, and stood frowning at the board. Then she gave a little nod of satisfaction. She'd been right. It was inevitable that white would now mate in two moves. Not a particularly difficult problem, she thought.")

Finger, Gerrie — The End Game, 2010 ("A slave ring with chess piece names. I used to play with Daddy when he got home early enough. Wait until Portia hears. She's some kind of master. She'll rip the Bishop's heart out.")

Fitzgerald, Laura — Dreaming in English, 2011 ("'Do you play chess? I like chess.' 'Chess, sure. And I'll teach you to play strip poker. You'll like that, too.'")

Fitzgerald, Laura — One True Theory of Love, 2009 ("'My son can be excitable sometimes,' she warned, 'especially when he gets his you-know-what kicked in chess, which is what's about to happen.'")

Fleming, Ian - Moonraker, 1955 ("Morphy, the great chess player, had a terrible habit. He would never raise his eyes from the game until he knew his opponent could not escape defeat. The he would slowly lift his great head and gaze cautiously at the man across the board. His opponent would feel the gaze and would slowly, humbly, raise his eyes to meet Morphy's. At that moment he would know it was no good continuing the game. The eyes Morphy said so. There was nothing left but surrender.")

Fleming, Ian - From Russia With Love, 1957

Foster, Alan Dean — Dirge, 2000 ("It was very much like a gigantic chess game, one that involved hundreds of pieces of varying strength engaged in simultaneous motion on an interplanetary scale.") Foster, Alan Dean — The Force Awakens, 2015 ("Sliding a finger across a flush control brought the chess set to life. The pieces steadied themselves before gazing up at Finn. Peculiar guy, this one, Han thought. He can deal with a battlefield wound but not an ordinary chess set.")

Foster, Alan Dean — The Tar-aiym Krang, 1972 ("When they discovered chess and judo, it was all over with fliptherock and that ilk. Try me at personality chess and I'll beat the freckles off you!")

Foster, Alan Dean — Star Trek into Darkness, 2013 ("'Game playing.' Kirk was nodding soberly to himself. 'Even a superman should know better than to play chess with a Vulcan.")

France, Anatole — At the Sign of the Reine Pedauque, 1892 ("Such, my son, is the nature of the glorious children of the suns, they are masters of the laws of the universe, as we of the rules of chess, and the course of the starts in heaven puzzles them no more than the movement of the chess-board of a king, rook, and bishop, trouble us.")

France, Anatole — Farinata Degli Uberti; or Civil War, 1900 ("The pursuit of such an interest is no mere game played according to rule, like chess or draughts.")

France, Anatole — On Life and Letters, 1911 ("When he entered the house of a friend his first business was to take off the sort of chess-board smock that made him look ridiculous.")

France, Anatole — The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard, 1881 ("Still smiling, he proposed me the 'Regle des Jeux de la Societe' — piquet, bezique, ecarte, whist, dice, draughts, and chess.")

Frazier, Robert - Rendezvous 2062, 1982

Freud, Martin — Any Survivors? 1967 ('I estimate that the man will be here in fifteen minutes. You have a chess board and chess pieces in the mess hall, is that right? I think so. Everything is in order then. A game of chess can take hours, I have been informed.')

Freymann-Weyr, Garret — The Kings Are Already Here, 2003

Freymann-Weyr, Garret — When I was Older, 2002 ("Henry never takes notes. He fills his notebook up with chess diagrams. Henry may be a genius, a chess prodigy, and a black belt in karate, but his grades were terrible — I'm his only friend outside of his karate class or his chess tutor.")

Frisch, Max — Homo Faber, 1957 ("I like chess because you can spend hours at a time without speaking. You don't even have to listen when your opponent talks. You stare at the board and it isn't in the least rude if you show no desire for personal contact, but devote all your attention to the game.")

Galsworthy, John — 'The First and Last' in Five Tales, 1918 ("There are some natures so constituted that, due to be hung at ten o'clock, they will play chess at eight.")

Galsworthy, John — The Country House, 1920 ("George moved into the bay-window. He knew nothing of chess-indeed, he could not stand the game.")

Galsworthy, John — The Island Pharisees, 1904 ("Do you play chess? There's young Smith wants a game.")

Garrow, Simon - The Amazing Adventure of Dan, the Pawn, 1983

Gavin, Thomas - Kingkill, 1977 ("an emissary from the Frankfurt chess club refused obstinately to engage forces until Schlumberger was thoroughly sober.")

Gerrold, David - Chess With A Dragon, 1987

Gerrold, David — Starhunt ("On the table in front of him is a chessboard, sixteen squares to a side. There are two pieces of board, a white flag-ship and a black one. Leen shakes his head. 'I — uh, I don't play chess that much.'")

Gilbert, Daniel — Kokomu, 1982

Gjellerup, Karl — The Pilgrim Kamanita, 1912 ("I added a thorough command of the game of chess with its sixty-four squares")

Glavinic, Thomas — Partie Remise (Adourned Game), 1999

Glavinic, Thomas - Carl Haffner's Love of the Draw, 2000

Glyn, Anthony - The Dragon Variation, 1969

Golden, Christopher — Child of the Hunt, 1998

Golden, Christopher — Hellboy: The Bones of Giants, 1997 ("I interrupted my chess game with Kate to come here, and I'm still rearranging my books. 'Kate doesn't even like chess. She only plays because you won't leave her alone about it.")

Golden, Christopher and Nancy Holder — Sunnydale High Yearbook, 1999 ("The chess club had a very good year. Membership was up to a five-year high, and four club members participated in the Southern California Young Masters of Chess Tournament.")

Golding, William — Darkness Visible, 1979 ("Stanhope was, after all, a celebrity, with his column, broadcasts and chess displays.")

Golding, William - Lord of the Flies, 1954 ("The only trouble was that he would never be a very good chess player")

Goldowsky, Howard — Masters of Technique, 2010

Gormley, Beatrice — If this is Sanity, Count Me In, 2006 ("'Check and mat,' yelled Chastity. 'It's plain to see that Unky taught you to play chess,' yelled I. We started another game.")

Gormley, Beatrice - The Magic Mean Machine, 1989

Gracq, Julien — A Dark Stranger, 1945 ("It had been cold and misty all afternoon, and at a table by myself in the smoking room I was trying unenthusiastically to solve a chess problem — a three-move according to the Indian strategy I assumed, a particularly tricky Holzhausen. The key kept eluding me and I'd got to that particular state of irritation well known to chess-problem solvers: something in my dignity made me inclined to declare the problem unsolvable.")

Gracq, Julien — Un Beau Tenebreux (A Beautiful Dark), 1945

Greaney, Mark — Back Blast, 2016 ("As he drove back over the Woodrow Wilson Bridge on his way to Prince Georges County airport, Denny allowed himself a moment of pride and satisfaction. He saw himself as a chess master, controlling the pieces on the board.")

Greaney, Mark — Commander in Chief (Tom Clancy — A Jack Ryan Novel), 2015 ("I see it in the media when they talk about Volodin as the chess master.")

Greaney, Mark — The Gray Man, 2009 ("Lloyd authoritatively barked orders, orchestrating the movements of the surveillance experts like chess pieces on a board.")

Green, Thomas — The chessboard of Life, 1876

Greenfeld, Josh — The Obsessive Chronicles, 2011

Greenfield, Casimir — Slow Poison, 2015 ("Glyn joined the chess club and played rugby on the sloping pitch, played tennis on the gravel courts, played cricket on the manicured lawns of Marling School.") Griffith, Michael — Zugzwang, 2003 ("Now, thanks to Wilbur, LeBeau has gone stark loony over some foreign game where you push little dolls around, punch an alarm clock, then write in code and wait. Wilbur's sixteen, and he spends his evenings hunched over a board or a book, jabbering about the Sugar Gambit in London, 1883, or the Two Nights of Morphine in New Orleans, 1858. At the mall he sets up in the atrium and matches wits against eight opponents at once.") Griffiths, John — The Memory Man, 1982

Guy, Will and Normal Knight — King, Queen, and Knight: A Chess Anthology in Prose and Verse, 1975

Haig, Brian — The Kingmaker, 2001 ("Yurichenko was a chess aficionado, which had brought him to numerous international events, where he was known to sit in the back row and critique the moves of the likes of Bobby Fischer and Gary Kasparov.")

Hale, Lucretia — 'The Queen of the Red Chessmen,' Atlantic Monthly, 1858 ("The box of chessmen had been left open all night. That was a great oversight! For everybody knows that the contending chessmen are but too eager to fight their battles over again by midnight, if a chance is only allowed them.")

Hall, Adam (Elleston Trevor) — Bishop in Check, 1953

Hall, Adam (Elleston Trevor) — Knight Sinister, 1951

Hall, Adam (Elleston Trevor) — Pawn in Jeopardy, 1954

Hall, Adam (Elleston Trevor) — Queen in Danger, 1952

Hall, Adam (Elleston Trevor) — Quiller Solitaire, 1992 ("I got out at the next corner and paid the driver and walked back toward the Cafe Brahms on the other side of the street and then crossed over, looking at the jade and ivory chess sets in the window of a store, putting in time.")

Hall, Adam (Elleston Trevor) — Rook's Gambit, 1955

Hall, Katy - My Secret Life, 1999

Hannibal, James — Shadow Maker, 2014 ("Kattan scanned the chessboard, carefully considering his next move. He was a renowned master strategist who could look at a plan and see every outcome, predict the enemies' every move and steer them toward destruction. He nurtured this ability by playing chess, and both his friends and his enemies considered him a master of the game.")

Hansen, Brooks - The Chess Garden, 1995

Hansen, Fredrik — Ghost: Prologue: SAS Modern Warfare Book 1, 2015 ("Despite his seniority, Zhukov was an educated, polite man. For Zhukov a military operation was a giant tactical game of chess; a cerebral pursuit not a physical one.")

Hansen, Fredrik — Ghost: Inception: SAS Modern Warfare Book 2, 2015 ("Chess Yuri, is the essence of war. It is the oldest and most simple representation of the battlefield.")

Hardy, Thomas — A Pair of Blue Eyes, 1873 (In the drawing room, after having been exclusively engaged with Mr. and Mrs. Swancourt through the intervening hour, Knight again found himself thrown with Elfride. She had been looking over a chess problem in one of the illustrated periodicals. 'You like chess, Miss Swancourt?' 'Yes. It is my favorite scientific game, indeed, excludes every other. Do you play?' 'I have played; though not lately.' 'Challenge him, Elfride,' said the rector heartily. 'She plays very well for a lady, Mr. Knight.')

Harness, Charles — Drunkard's Endgame, 2015 ("I shall be working with Chief Datik on a second matter, one that will by itself consume a great deal of time." "And why might that be?" "Our chess game. Slowly, slowly, move by move, I can permit him to develop a winning position. Now, as long as he thinks he is winning at chess, I can probably stall the Algorithm.")

Harness, Charles — Krono, 2013 (During the last few sessions the chess position had somehow shifted significantly. How had it happened? It was no longer a popular draw. It was now a sure win for D, who had the black pieces. The computers had worked out this exact position before Konteau was born. It was in all the end-game books. And yet D still played slowly, carefully, with life-and death deliberation.)

Harness, Charles L. — 'The Chessplayers,' The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, October 1953

Harness, Charles — The Paradox Men, 2015 ("Chess — Eskimo?" he murmured with puzzled politeness. Several of the men smiled. "Sure, Eskimo," boomed Miles impatiently. "Never been in a solarion before. Has the sweat he was born with. Probably fresh out of school and loaded down with chess sets to keep our minds occupied so we won't brood." "I rather like a game of chess myself.")

Harper, Piers - Checkmate at Chess City, 2000

Hauptmann, Gerhart — Atlantis, 1912 ("Wendler, who was off duty, passed by with a chess-board under his arm.")

Hauptmann, Gerhart — Colleague Crampton, 1914 ("Come on, let's have a game of chess.")

Heath, Sandra — Breaking the Rules, 2013 ("Inside the castle hall was bright with jewels and gold, and he found two young noblemen, Kynan and his younger brother, Cadfan, playing a board game that reminded Macsen of chess, except that the ivory and blue glass "men" were animals — horses, dogs, and squirrels.")

Heath, Sandra — Lucy's Christmas Angel, 2015 ("It was a Tudor house, gabled and halftimbered, and to one side of it was a topiary garden that resembled a chess board.")

Heath, Sandra — My Lady Domino, 2015 ("The game of chess they had been about to commence was left untouched.")

Heath, Sandra — The Solid Silver Chess Set, 2002

Hehl, Eileen — Out of Love, 1986 ("Do you want to join the chess club? We're looking for more members." Jill shuddered. Did she look like the type who'd be recruited for the chess club? "No, thank you," she said.)

Hehl, Eileen - Playing Games (Sweet Dreams series), 1986

Heidenstam, Verner von — A King and His Campaigners, 1902 ("This war is like a game of chess, in which all is to protect the King.")

Heinlein, Robert — "Citizen of the Galaxy," Astounding Science Fiction, 1957 ("Mathematics Thorby saw no use in, but when he thought of it as a game, like chess, it actually became more fun.")

Heinlein, Robert — "Gentlemen, Be Seated!" Argosy, May 1948 ("He sets aside the honor — if Konski wants to collect the chess money he won while waiting to be rescued, he will have to come to Des Moines.")

Heinlein, Robert — "Methuselah's Children," Astounding Science Fiction, Aug, Sep 1941

Heinlein, Robert — Starman Jones, 1953 ("That's nice. What have you got there?" It was a three-dimensional chess set. Max had played the game with his uncle, it being one that all astrogators played. Finding that some of the chartsmen and computermen played it, he had invested his tips in a set from the ship's slop chest "It's solid chess. Ever seen it?" "Yes. But I didn't know you played it" "Why not? Ever play flat chess?")

Heinlein, Robert — The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, 1966 ("Activities include stock brokerage, farming interests. Attends theater, concerts, etc. Probably member Luna City Chess Club and Luna Assoc, d'Echecs.")

Heinlein, Robert - The Rolling Stones, 1952 ("I'll keep my phone open and we'll play chess while I'm away." Buster clouded up. "It's no fun to play chess by telephone. I can't tell what you are thinking.")

Heinlein, Robert — "They," Unknown, April 1941 ("I'll play chess with you." "All right, all right." Hayward made a gesture of impatient concession. "We've played chess every day for a week. If you will talk, I'll play chess.")

Heinlein, Robert — Time Enough for Love, 1973 ("Pool is an open game, like chess. Difficult to cheat. He fetched me home from the chess club and saved me a soaking.")

Hendrix, Howard — Lightpaths, 2010 ("[positions] are overlooked by event top grandmasters' — which was also said of the first computer to defeat the world's last human chess champion, by the way. In joining VAJRA, I've benefited from an insight I'd overlooked, a key point in the game. There's a deeper game, a more serious game that needs playing. The game in which troubled gods play chess against the unbeatable machinery of themselves.")

Hendrix, Howard — Standing Wave, 2010 ("Then troubled gods played chess against unbeatable machinery — as he said. Chess for the highest of stakes they played, once, some time, in some tale-eaten future.")

Hendrix, Howard — The Labyrinth Key, 2006 ("His undergraduate degrees were in physics and electrical engineering," Wang replied, trying not to sound defensive, but not quite managing it. "He has genius-level mathematical aptitude. Chess expert, crossword-puzzle addict — like a lot of cryptanalysts, actually.")

Hendrix, Howard — The Spears of God, 2006 ("Most of what they looked through was typical family memorabilia — a large crop of photos featuring Jacinta at various ages, news articles on her accomplishments going all the way back to science fair and high school chess team victories.")

Henrichs, Bertina — The Chess Player, 2005 ("She turned and saw a chess board on which little black and white pieces were deployed. A game in progress had been interrupted. Eleni looked more closely at the piece she held in her hand. It was a little black pawn.") Herbert, Frank — "The Nothing," Fantastic Universe, January 1956 ("You're not repulsive," he said. "I just object to having my whole life ordered out for me like a chess set up.")

Herbert, Frank — Whipping Star, 1969

Herrick, Steven — Black Painted Fingernails, 2011 ("Pete and I shared six years of chesse rolls, file-swapping and chess games in school.")

Herrick, Steven — Rhyming Boy, 2013 ("We dodge between ladies, with shopping trolleys and the men playing giant chess on the forecourt of the library.")

Herrick, Steven — Slice, 2011

Hesse, Hermann — 'The Chess Player' in Steppenwolf, 1926 ("I bowed low in gratitude to the gifted chess player, put the little pieces in my pocket and withdrew through the narrow door.")

Heyse, Paul — "Embroideress of Treviso" in Barbarossa and Other Tales, 1874 ("Frau Helena was setting up her men for a seventh trial of skill at chess")

Heyse, Paul — The Children of the World, 1890 ("When the doctor entered, Balder was sitting at his turning lathe, making a set of ivory chess-men.")

Heyse, Paul — The Dead Lake & Other Tales ("Besides he is a good sportsman, an excellent judge of horses, and the best chess player in the neighborhood.")

Heyse, Paul — The Romance of the Canoness: A Life-History, 1888 ("So, if you have no interest in chess, do not feel under any restraint, but go to your room, if you prefer.") Mademoiselle Suzon beats the baron in chess.

Hirano, Kohta — "Drifters", Volume 1, 2011 Hochberg, Burt - 64-Square Looking Glass: Great Games of Chess in World Literature, 1993

Hirsch, Franz — "In the Time of Trial," The International magazine, 1898 ("Leaving my uncle safe at a game of chess with the surgeon of our hospital, I forced my way, with all the carelessness of youth, among the good hearted, gay Frenchmen, clearing a path for myself with French jests, until I reached the school-house.")

Hruska, Bronwen — Accelerated, 2013 ("Out chess team has won the national championship ten years in a row.")

Huigen, Rene - De meter van Napoleon (1988)

Hunt, Lynda — Fish in a Tree, 2015 ("I think your mind learns in pictures, and it helps you be a really good chess player. We've played several times now and you have learned it fast and improve a lot without much time.") Hurwitz, Johanna — Baseball Fever, 1981

Hurwitz, Johanna — Elisa Michaels, Bigger and Better, 2012 (Russell forgot that he was going to ignore their baby-sitter. "Hi." He greeted him. "Do you know how to play chess?" Eugene Spencer's eyes lit up. "I don't know anything about baby-sitting," he told Russell, "but I'm great at chess. I'm on the chess team at school. I'll probably beat you in a half a dozen moves.")

Ipcar, Dahlov - The Warlock of Night, 1969

Jackson, Anita - A Deadly Game, 1979 ("My chess set was always with me.")

Jackson, Anita — A Game of Life and Death, 2001 ("Uncle Fred was mad about playing chess. I wasn't very keen on it myself but I had a game with him every Monday night. Just to keep him happy. Just to keep on the right side of him. I played so many games of chess that I got pretty good at it.")

Jacobs, W.W. — "The Monkey's Paw," 1902 ("Father and son were at chess, the former, who possessed ideas about the game involving radical changes, putting the king into such sharp and unnecessary perils that it even provoked comment from the white-haired old lady knitting placidly by the fire.")

Jones, Tanya — Trotter's Bottom, 1997

Jorgensen, H. — The Hall of the Vampires, 2002, ("'When I found the chess set." Began Adam, "I set it up in the hall to look at the pieces. They have very detailed weapons. When I came back after dinner, someone had moved a piece, so I moved one too.")

Kantor, Melissa — The Darlings Are Forever, 2011 ("Laughing, Natalya crossed the room and pulled her father's old wooden chess set off the shelf, then went to sit at the small table in the corner of the crowded living room. Her father finished filling the pipe he only smoked when he played chess, and sat down across from her, handling the pieces in a way that was simultaneously familiar and respectful. Once their pieces were in position, he grunted briefly and looked across the board at her. She nodded, and in response, he moved a pawn. The game had begun. Natalya loved chess.")

Kantor, Melissa — The Darlings in Love, 2012 ("She was almost half an hour early for lunch with Victoria and Jane, and she stupidly planned on watching the chess players in Washington Square Park. She loved seeing men (they were always men for some reason) curled over their games, totally oblivious to the fact that she was lingering at the periphery of their vision. But clearly no sane person would be playing chess outside on a day when it made your lungs ache just to breathe.")

Keckhut, John - The Dublin Pawn, 1977

Kelly, Carla — Coming Home for Christmas, 2011 ("I doubt the foretopman will know you are there, but Ralph Gooding will probably challenge you to chess." "Perhaps I will defeat him this time." Father Hilario said with a chuckle.)

Kelly, Carla — Marian's Christmas Wish, 1989 (Marion glared at her opponent. "You are unscrupulous, sir." "I am when it comes to chess." He looked over his shoulder. "Alistair is asleep. Tiresome boy. I shall have to add the logs myself." He made no move to rise. "You see, Marian, I don't care to be beaten at chess, either.")

Keyes, Frances Parkinson - The Chess Players (1960)

Kienzle, William — Bishop as Pawn, 1994

Kienzle, William — Death Wears a Red Hat, 2012 ("How do you like playing detective, Father?" "It's as good as chess ever was. Father Brown, one side: watch my smoke!")

Kienzle, William — Shadow of Death, 2012 ("The Inspector guess Toussaint would be a worthy chess opponent; he was not likely to come in second in any game of wits.")

Kienzle, William — The Sacrifice, 2013 (Sue shook her head. "He's the only movable piece in this chess game.")

King, Sara — Fortune's Rising, 2014

King, Stephen — Christine, 1983 ("For Arnie, going to class in the shop area was like visiting a demilitarized zone. Then, if he got back alive after period seven, he'd run all the way to the other end of the school with his chessboard and men under his arm for a chess club meeting or a game.")

King, Stephen — Wizard and Glass (The Dark Tower #4), 1997 ("He thought of Aaron Deepneau in the Manhattan Restaurant of the Mind, Aaron Deepneau telling him to come back anytime, play a little chess, and oh by the way, old fatso made a pretty good cup of coffee.")

Kipling, Rudyard — A Diversity of Creatures, 1917 ("I wish I'd brought chess, but I can't play chess. What can we do?")

Kipling, Rudyard — Actions and Reactions, 1914 ("He played chess — you don't know what that meant to me — like a master.")

Kipling, Rudyard — Captain Courageous, 1897 ("Disko moved the We're Here from berth to berth, always with the fish, as a blindfolded chess-player moves on the unseen board.")

Kipling, Rudyard — The Light That Failed, 1890 ("The Nilghai rolled in at mid-day for chess and polite conversation.")

Kitamura, Katie — "Goodwill" in Masters of Technique, 2010 ("Most of the time my dad couldn't find anybody to play with. He'd play games out of a book and spend hours just sitting and staring at the board. Moving the pieces back and forth. He wasn't even that good at it. The only time I saw him someone he got his ass whooped. He never taught me to play and that was something I always regretted. I understood why, though. Chess was the one thing that belonged to him, and he needed to keep it that way.")

Klass, David — Grandmaster, 2014 ("Chess club was done for the day, and so was I. I had played three games that afternoon, two of which I'd manage to lose in the first fifteen moves. I tried to remind myself that I had just taken up the game six months ago and was still learning the basics, but there were times when I wanted to heave the nearest chess set out the window and never touch another rook or pawn again.")

Knight, Norman — Chess Pieces: An Anthology in Prose and Verse, 1949

Kraai, Jesse — Lisa: A Chess Novel, 2013

Kraft, Eric — Do Clams Bite?, 2012 ("Painted on the floor would be a chess board, where I would be able to play living games with my playmates in the neighborhood.")

Kraft, Eric — Inflating a Dog, 2012 ("They were marked with wooden posts, painted black along their shafts and white on their rounded tops, which resembled the mitres of the bishops in my plastic chess set.")

Kraft, Eric — Lenny and Mel: After-School Confidential, 2012

Kraus, Robert - Mort the Sport, 2000

Krol, Gerrit - Een schaaknovelle, 2002

Kuttner, Henry (Lewis Padgett) - Chessboard Planet, 1956

Kuttner, Henry — Fury (Destination: Infinity), 1947 ("Life in the Keeps was very much like a game of chess.")

Kuttner, Henry (Lewis Padgett) — The Fairy Chessmen, 1946

Lagerlof, Selma — Liliecrona's Home, 1914 ("For an hour or two he sat playing chess with the Pastor.")

Lawrinson, Julia — Chess Nuts, 2010

Laxness, Halldor — The Atom Station, 1948 ("Two boys playing chess. They sat facing each other, crouched over a chessboard")

le Carre, John (David John Moore Cornwell) — Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, 1974 ("He had a medical, watched television in his hut, and played a bit of chess with Cranko, who was running reception.") Leiber, Fritz - A Pail of Air, 1979

Leiber, Fritz — Knight to Move, 1965 ("The beautiful hawk face hooded by black bangs searched the golden hall below, where a thousand intelligent beasts from half as many planets were playing chess.")

Leiber, Fritz — The Change War, 1955

Leiber, Fritz — "Midnight by the Morphy Watch," If, Aug 1974

Leiber, Fritz — "The 64-Square Madhouse," If, May 1962 ("Silently, so as not to shock anyone with illusions about well dressed young women, Sandra Lea Grayling cursed the day she had persuaded the Chicago Space Mirror that there would be all sorts of human interest stories to be picked up at the first international grandmaster chess tournament in which an electronic computing machine was entered.")

Leiber, Fritz — "The Big Time," 1958 ("Maud had sat down at the other end of the bar and was knitting — it's one of those habits like chess and quiet drinking, or learning to talk by squeak box, that we pick up to pass the time in the Place in the long stretches between parties.")

Leiber, Fritz — "The Creature from Cleveland Depths," 1962 ("Leaving the hall door open Gusterson got out his .38 and cleaned and loaded it, meanwhile concentrating on a chess problem with the idea of confusing a hypothetical psionic monitor. Daisy came dragging in without her hat, looking as if she'd been concentrating on a chess problem for hours herself and just now given up.")

Leiber, Fritz — "The Night of the Long Knives," Amazing Stories, Jan 1960 ("It was a little like two savages trying to decide how to play chess by looking at the pieces.")

Leiber, Fritz — "The Wolf Pack" ("Let Freedom Ring"), 1950 ("I found another of those damned chess sets." M'Caslrai stirred, slowly rubbed his dark-guttered eyelids. "Makes three in a week," J'Wilobe continued in staccato bursts. "I destroyed it, of course, but it shook me up. Obviously, someone knows I could have been the greatest chess-player in the world.")

Leithauser, Brad — Hence, 1990 ("It would be devoted solely to chess, with a chess library and all the best players given free accommodation, year in, year out, and Timothy feels an old, bitter disappointment, that such as island doesn't exist.")

Lethem, Jonathan — Dissident Gardens, 2013 ("It began with chess. Cicero had lately been savaging all comers at I.S. 125's chess club, so Miriam, on Rose's counsel, had proposed to bring him to call on Cousin Lenny at the chess store on MacDougal, there to play and have measured whether he might be a prodigy, a wunderkind.")

Lettrick, Robert — Frenzy, 2014 (Chess wasn't a game Heath played often, but he liked it way more than Zombie Buffet. He strolled over to Will and sat down on the opposite side of the chessboard. "How about a game?" "Sure. What have you got?" Will asked. "I don't teach chess for free." "I didn't realize this would be a lesson." "You will." Will held up a compass — the thing Heath had assumed was a pocket watch. "If you beat me, you can have this.")

Levery, Steven — "Steinitz" in Masters of Technique, 2010

Levy, Elizabeth - The Computer That Said Steal Me, 1983

Levy, Elizabeth — Danger & Diamonds, 2015 (Philip and I sat by one of the swivel chairs on the game deck with a game of chess between us. "I bet you play chess well," I said to Philip quietly. "How do you know that?" he asked. "This entire voyage has been a chess game!")

Levy, Elizabeth - Vampire State Building, 2002 ("I don't think everything about the Web is good," said Mrs. Bamford. "That's why I moved the computer into the living room, so I can watch what the boys are doing. Still, I do think it's great that Sam gets to play chess with a boy from Romania.")

Leypoldt, Augusta and L. Pylodet — Checkmated and Other Stories of Dr. J.B. Quies, 1886

Little, Ashley — The New Normal, 2013 ("I joined the chess club at the start of this year. I'm the only girl in it. Roy is in grade twelve. He's the only member of the chess club I haven't beaten yet. Roy and I are the MVPs in the club.")

Lohr, Robert — The Chess Machine, 2005

London, Jack - The Jacket, 1915 ("As example, I taught Oppenheimer to play chess. Consider how tremendous such an achievement is — to teach a man, thirteen cells away, by means of knuckle-raps; to teach him to visualize a chessboard, to visualize all the pieces, pawns and positions, to know the various manners of moving; and to teach him it all so thoroughly that he and I, by pure visualization, were in the end able to play entire games of chess in our minds.")

Lovejoy, David — Moral Victories, 2008

Lysiak, Waldemar — The Chess Player, 1980

MacInnes, Helen — Pray for a Brave Heart, 1955

Macomber, Debbie — 74 Seaside Avenue, 2007

Mahony, Mary - Stand Tall, Harry, 2002

Malzberg, Barry - Tactics of Conquest (Penguin Putman, 1974)

Mann, Thomas — The Magic Mountain, 1924 ("Sometimes they played chess on Hans Castorp's bed table — Joachim had brought a set with him from down below.")

Marquez, Gabriel Garcia - Love in the Time of Cholera, 1989 (Dr. Juvenal Urbino perfected his chess game at the Parish Cafe.

Martin, George - Unsound Variations (Amazing, Jan 1982)

Mathewson, R.L. — Checkmate (Neighbor from Hell #3), 2012

Maurensig, Paolo - The Luneburg Variation (Farrar 1997)

Mazzantini, Margaret — Twice Born, 2011 ("The old men are already at it playing chess in the square,")

McDevitt, Jack — Seeker, 2005

Meras, Icchokas - De glimlach van Busia, 1980

Meyer, Stephenie — Breaking Dawn (Twilight, #4), 2008

Michaels, David (Grant Blackwood) — Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Checkmate, 2006 ("At its heart, the mastery of Xiangqi, and its lesser cousin, chess, was nothing more than recognizing the patterns your opponent was trying to hide, and creating patterns your opponent will fail to see until too late.")

Michaels, David (Grant Blackwood) — Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Checkmate, 2007 ("Still Fisher was unsurprised to find that he was enjoying himself. The challenge of playing and winning the espionage chess game with only your wits and guile was intoxicating.")

Middleton, Thomas - A Game at Chess, 1624

Middleton, Thomas — Women Beware Women, 1657

Milky, D. - Treasure Chess, 2004

Morressy, John — Kedrigern and the Charming Couple, 1990

Morrison, William — The Sack, 1950

Morrow, Bradford — The Diviner's Tale, 2010

Mosley, Walter — And Sometimes I Wonder About You, 2015 ("Johnny brought out a magnetic chess set with red and white plastic pieces that he'd owned since he was a boy of six. Ring, the boy's father, taught Johnny the nuances of chess.")

Mountford, Peter — The Dismal Science, 2014

Muldoon, Kathleen — Checkmate, 2005

Murphy, Warren (Dev Stryker) and Molly Cochran - Grandmaster, 1994 ("The chess player, Ivan Kutsenko, was waiting in the dirty little cafe off Gorky Street. He was the chess champion of the world, famed for the subtle, far-reaching brilliance of his play and his total nervelessness at the chessboard.")

Myers, Walter — On a Clear Day, 2014

Nabokov, Vladimir - The Defense (Zashchita Luzhina) (1930)

Nabokov, Vladimir - Lolita (1955)

Nesser, Hakan — Borkmann's Point, 2007

Nesser, Hakan — Woman with Birthmarks, 2010

Neville, Katherine - The Eight (Ballentine, 1988)

Neville, Katherine - The Fire, 2008

Neville, Katherine — En Passant

Nichols, Alix — You're the One, 2014

Nicholson, Peggy — Checkmate, 1991

Norton, Hana — The Sixth Surrender, 2010

O;Malley, William — The Place Called Skull, 2012 ("In the evening, Paul sat in the dayroom playing chess with Heinrigh Boell, a straight-backed Muenchener with falcon eyes. Boell had little taste for priests, but Paul was the only one he couldn't beat at chess in five moves.")

O'Neill, Eugene — Long Day's Journey into Night, 1941 ("For a moment, they play the game, like mechanical chess players.")

Oe, Kenzaburo — The Crazy Iris, 1985 ("In the evening I played chess with my friend but soon became tired and went to bed.")

Orwell, George - 1984 (1949)

Osborne, Jon — A Game of Chance, 2013

Padgett, Lewis - Chessboard Planet, 1946

Padgett, Lewis - The Fairy Chessmen, 1946

Padilla, Ignacio - Shadow Without a Name (Farrar, 2003)

Pamuk, Orhan — 'A Lengthy Game of Chess' in The Black Book, 1990

Parker, Andrew — The Chess Player, 2006

Partel, Frank — The Chess Players, 2011

Patrick, Marie — A Kiss in the Shadows, 2015 ("Now that that's done, you up for a game of chess? I haven't touched the board since your last visit." He gestured to the small table in the corner, the chess pieces, carved from ivory, glowing dully in the lamplight. "As I recall, I had your queen on the run.")

Perez-Reverte, Arturo - The Flanders Panel (Bantam, 1996)

Perry, Steve — Tom Clancy's Net Force, 1998 ("The two men in the car listened to a radio playing country music at a low volume, and played chess using a small magnetic board mounted on the dash.")

Perry, Steve — Tom Clancy's Net Force: Night Moves, 1999 ("Physicality discounted, women don't think the same was as men. Female chess players at the highest levels don't beat the male champions.")

Perry, Steve and Larry Segriff — Tom Clancy's Net Force: Springboard, 2005 ("Bernard had been invited to play chess by an Englishman named Sykes.Sykes had, according to the story, looked positively gleeful. He'd been ready for a fine round of pummel-the Colonel, but instead had been destroyed by Bernard, who in fact was a ranked chess player and had competed nationally.")

Perry, Steve and Larry Segriff — Tom Clancy's Net Force: The Archimedes Effect, 2006 ("And she knew Gridley's rep — he had been two years ahead of her in school, already the boy wonder, and at this level, it was like playing chess against a master at the top of his game — you didn't make a mistake and hope it would get by, because it almost never would.")

Peyton, Richard - Sinister Gambits: Chess Stories and Murder and Mystery (Souvenir Press, 1991)

Pilhes, Rene-Victor — La position de Philidor (The Philidor's Position), 1992

Pirandello, Luigi — Berecche and the War, 1934 ("The essence of the caricature is in the chess-board: meant to show that Berecche sees the world like that, in squares, and walks through it in the German way with a deliberate, measured tread like an honest pawn dependant on the king, the castles and the knights.")

Pirandello, Luigi — The Fish Trap, 1912 ("He painted cardinals in full regalia playing chess in a cloister.")

Poe, Edgar Allen - Maezel's Chess-Player, 1836

Poe, Edgar Allen — The Murders in the Rue Morgue, 1841

Pontiggia, Giuseppe — The Invisible Player, 1985

Powers, Tim — Three Days to Never, 2006

Pratchett, Terry — Discworld, 1983

Propper, Ryan - The Ultimate Chess Challenge (1999)

Quin-Harkin, Janet — 101 Ways to Meet Mr. Right, 1985

Randall, Lindsey — A Dangerous Courtship, 2012 ("Lady Pamela quickly reached for the sheepskin bundle, undid the twine, and at the last revealed the black ivory chess piece with its gold base and note tucked inside. Return the diamond and chess set?")

Randisi, Robert — Chesmaster, 1982

Raskin, Ellen — The Westing Game, 1978

Rayne, Sarah — The Sin Eater, 2013

Reilly, Matthew — The Tournament, 2013

Rezvani, Serge — Crazy About Chess, 1997

Richardson, Maurice - "A Quiet Game of Chess" in The Exploits of Engelbrecht (1948)

Robinson, Jeremy and Sean Ellis, Callsign: King — The Brainstorm Trilogy, 2012 ("King may have been the head of Chess Team, but Deep Blue was its central nervous system. When the group had first been mustered, they had believed the mysterious Dee Blue — the code name was an homage to the computer that had defeated Gary Kasparov in the 1990's — to be a cyber-warrior with s Spec-Ops background and almost unlimited information resources.

Robinson, Jeremy — Instinct, 2011

Robinson, Jeremy — Pulse, 2010

Robinson, Jeremy — Threshold, 2011

Robinson, Nancy K. - Countess Veronica (1994)

Roggeveen, Leonard - Werldkampioen 2003

Rolland, Romain — Liluli, 1920 ("Diplomacy is a game of chess. The rules demand that, to win, one must lose pawns. The pawns are there; we have only to put them on the chess-board.")

Romig, Aleatha - Truth (Consequence, #2), 2012

Ross, Julia — The Seduction, 2002

Rovin, Jeff — Tom Clancy's Op-Center: Balance of Power, 1998 ("For August, the question was the same as it was in chess: whether an exchange of high ranked pieces was worth it. For him, the answer had always been no. Depending upon who was sharper and better prepared, it was better to keep the game going and wait for the other player to make a mistake.")

Rovin, Jeff — Tom Clancy's Op-Center: Call to Treason, 2004 ("The investigation was also draining. It was not just a chess game but a chess game on multiple levels.")

Rowling, J.K. - Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, 1997

Rowling, J.K. — Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, 1998

Rowling, J.K. — Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, 1999

Rowling, J.K. — Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, 2000

Rowling, J.K. — Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, 2003

Rowling, J.K. — Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, 2007

Rushdie, Salman - East, West ('The Courter'), 1994

Russ, Joanna - A Game of Vlet (Fantasy & Science Fiction, Feb 1974)

Saberhagen, Fred - Pawn to Infinity (Ace, 1982)

Saberhagen, Fred - To Move and Win, 1982

Salzmann, Jerome - The Chess Reader (New York, 1949)

Sawaski, James - The Chess Team (iUniverse, 2005)

Sayers, Dorothy — Gaudy Night, 1935

Sayers, Dorothy — Striding Folly, 1939

Schmais, Libby — The Pillow Book of Lotus Lowenstein, 2009

Shakespeare, William - The Tempest, 1610

Shan, Darren — Lord Loss, 2005

Shaw, George Bernard — Back to Methuselah, 1921 ("Most people, including myself, play chess (when they play at all) from hand to mouth, and can hardly recall the last move but one, or foresee the next but two.")

Shaw, George Bernard — The Irrational Knot, 1880 ("[Chess] is a foolish expedient for making idle people believe they are doing something very clever, when they are only wasting their time."

Shepherd, William G. - The Chessmen, 1978

Shura, Mary Francis - The Josie Gambit (Putnam 1986)

Sienkiewicz, Henryk — Hania, 1898 ("He and I began to play chess.")

Sienkiewicz, Henryk - The Knights of the Cross, 1900 ("They played that evening also, not only draughts, but chess and dice.")

Sienkiewicz, Henryk — Without Dogma, 1891 (He engages Anieala's attention, makes jokes, and teaches her to play chess."

Silverberg, Robert — Schwartz Between the Galaxies, 1974

Simmons, Dan - Carrion Comfort (Dark Harvest, 1989)

Siniac, Pierre — Le mystere de la Sombre Zone (The Mystery of the Dark Zone), 1999

Singer, Isaac - Shadows of the Hudson, 1997 ("At the age of seven he had played chess in the Commercial Union against twenty-four veteran Warsaw chess players, winning seventeen games and drawing four."

Smith, Cordwainer — Mother Hitton's Littul Kittons, 1961

Smith, Kent — Incident at the The Sicilian Dragon, 1981

Smith, Martin Cruz — Stalin's Ghost, 2013 ("Chess demands discipline and analysis to reach the top. And in chess if you aren't at the top, where are you?" Platonov spread his arms. "Teaching idiots basic openings. Left, right, left, right! That's why Zhenya is such as waste." In his passion the grandmaster backed into the wall a knocked a framed photograph to the floor. Behind the two men stood children in costume as chess pieces.) Smith, Martin Cruz — Three Stations, Book 7, 2013

Smullyan, Raymond - Chess Mysteries of Sherlock Holmes (Random House, 1994)

Snodgrass, Melinda - Queen's Gambit Declined (1989)

Soltis, Andy - Los Voraces, 2019: A Chess Novel (2003)

Somerville, Patrick — A Game I Once Enjoyed, 2007

Steinbeck, John — Sweet Tuesday, 1954 ("There must be some way to kind of bend the odds in chess.")

Stewart, Alfred - Reflections on the Looking-Glass, 1982

Stout, Rex - Gambit (Viking, 1962)

Strickland, Brad — The Sign of the Sinister Sorcerer, 2008 ("The magic spell that Uncle Jonathan had cast on them gave the chess pieces crabby, fluty little voices, and they complained constantly about how they were being moved.")

Stryker, Dev - End Game (1994)

Stuckart, Diane — The Queen's Gambit, 2008

Sutcliff, Rosemary - Chess-dream in a Garden (Candlewick, 1993)

Sutherland, Fae — Checkmate, 2011

Swanwick, Michael — Griffin's Egg, 1992

Symons, Julian — 'The Best Chess Player in the World' in The Tigers of Subtopia and Other Stories, 1983

Szpiner, Francis — Checkmate, 1990

Tan, Amy - The Joy Luck Club (Ladies Home Journal 1989)

Templin, Stephen and Howard Wasdin, SEAL Team Six: Outcasts, 2012

Tepper, Sheri - Necomancer Nine, 1983

Tepper, Sheri - King's Blood Four, 1989

Tepper, Sheri - Wizard's Eleven, 1989

Tevis, Walter - The Queen's Gambit (Dell 1984)

Theroux, Paul — My Other Life, 1996 ("For three years Uncle Hal had worn nothing but black clothes and — someone said — a cape. I never saw the cape. He was expert at table tennis, pool, basketball, and chess.") Timmer, Ernst - Het waterrad van Ribe, 1990

Tower, Wells — "Executors of Important Energies," Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned, 2009

Truzzi, Marcello - Chess in Literature (Avon 1974)

Undset, Sigrid — Kristin Lavransdatter II: The Wife, 1921 ("They had a chessboard between them and they were moving the pieces in silence, after much reflection.")

Undset, Sigrid — Kristin Lavransdatter III: The Cross, 1922 ("Naakkve and Bjorgulf were sitting at the chessboard.")

Valentine, Allyson — How (Not) to Find a Boyfriend, 2014

Valentine, Lex — Mating, 2012

Van Dine, S.S. (Willard Wright) — The Bishop Murder Case, 1928

Vance, Gerald, Equation of Doom, 1957

Vanyoos, NB — Galactic Checkmate, 2010

Valente, Catherynne — White Lines on a Green Field, 2011 (She didn't care about chess, but it looked good on her applications, and she turned out to be terrifying good at it.")

Vernon, Roger Lee — "The Chess Civilization," The Space Frontiers, 1955

Veryan, Patricia — Time's Fool, 1992

Vogt, Alfred E. van - The Players of Null-A (Berkeley, 1966)

Vonnegut, Kurt — All the King's Horses, 1951

Vonnegut, Kurt - Welcome to the Monkey House (1998)

Wainwright, Michael — Faulken's Gambit: Chess and Literature, 2011

Wakefield, H.R. — Professor Pownall's Oversight, 1928

Walcott, Derek — White Egrets, 2010 ("The chessmen are as rigid on their chessboard as those life-sized terra-cotta warriors.")

Wallace, Rich — Perpetual Check, 2009

Waterman, Andrew - Poetry of Chess, 1981

Wati, Arena — Wheels Within Wheels, 2010

Watson, Ian - Queenmagic, Kingmagic (1986)

Weinreb, Michael — The Curious Case of Sanjay Finch, 2010

Weitz, Michael — Even Dead Men Play Chess, 2009

Weitz, Michael — The Grandmaster's King, 2013

Westlake, Donald — What's So Funny?, 2007

Wheatcroft, John — "The Forfeit," Slow Exposures, 1986

Whitney, Phyllis - Hunter's Green (Doubleday, 1995)

Williams, Brad — A Matter of Confidence, 1973

Wilson, Eric — Valley of Bones, 2010

Witzsche, Rolf — Brighter Than the Sun, 2005

Wolfe, Gene — The Fifth Head of Cerberus, 1972

Wolfe, Gene - The Marvelous Brass Chessplaying Automaton (1977)

Wong, Janet - Alex and the Wednesday Chess Club, 2004

Woods, Hazel — This is How I'd Love You, 2014

Woods, Sherryl — The Bridal Path: Ashley, 2014 ("She just wasn't the daring type, after all, even if she once risked her entire future on a chess game.") Woro, Eric - Under the Black Sun (1995)

Xingjian, Gao — The Bus Stop, 1981 ("I'm going in [to town] for a game of chess.")

Yaffe, Charles - Alekhine's Anguish: A Novel of the Chess World (1999)

Yeats, William — Deirdre, 1907

Yeats, William — Dhoya, 1891 ("Dhoya. I have come to play chess against thee, for well thou knowest, dear to the perfect warrior after war is chess.")

Yeats, William — John Sherman, 1891 ("Sherman was playing chess in the smoking-room, right hand against left.")

Yeats, William — Time and the Witch Vivien, 1882

York, Andrew — The Doom Fisherman, 1969

Zeugner, John — Manila Gambit, 2015

Zelazny, Roger — A Rose for Eccleslassteswhich, 1963

Zelazny, Roger - Unicorn Variations (Timescape, 1983)

Zelman, Anita - The Right Moves (St Martin's Press, 1988)

Zweig, Stefan - The Royal Game, 1941





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