Netflix’s most watched limited series to date! The thrilling novel of one young woman’s journey through the worlds of chess and drug addiction. When eight-year-old Beth Harmon’s parents are killed in an automobile accident, she’s placed in an orphanage in Mount Sterling, Kentucky. Plain and shy, Beth learns to play chess from the janitor in the basement and discovers she is a prodigy. Though … prodigy. Though penniless, she is desperate to learn more—and steals a chess magazine and enough money to enter a tournament. Beth also steals some of her foster mother’s tranquilizers to which she is becoming addicted.
At thirteen, Beth wins the chess tournament. By the age of sixteen she is competing in the US Open Championship and, like Fast Eddie in The Hustler, she hates to lose. By eighteen she is the US champion—and Russia awaits . . .
Fast-paced and elegantly written, The Queen’s Gambit is a thriller masquerading as a chess novel—one that’s sure to keep you on the edge of your seat.
“The Queen’s Gambit is sheer entertainment. It is a book I reread every few years—for the pure pleasure and skill of it.” —Michael Ondaatje, Man Booker Prize–winning author of The English Patient
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Even if you watched the series, this book is worth a read.
I recently watched the recently released Netflix series by the same name, and I was impressed. The acting, direction, pacing, and attention to detail are worth watching. Of course, after reading the book, I can see why the show did so well.
The book, though, is a masterpiece of writing, in my opinion. Tevis’s pacing and ability to capture a scene is interesting to study and a joy to read. It is interesting to see the game of chess, in my view, become a character itself. Beth, the main character, not only struggles with her own internal and external conflicts, but she has conflicts with chess. How to get better. How to overcome its seemingly infinite possibilities to see cracks in her own weaknesses and her opponents’ weaknesses or mistakes.
Even if you don’t enjoy chess (or even games) you’ll likely enjoy this story. It is a story that can resonate with anyone – how to overcome life’s challenges, despite being knocked down on occasion. How to learn how to ask for help and accept help that is offered in order to become a better person. To see how much time it takes to become better a something, and that no matter how much natural talent someone has, any skill requires many hours of singular focus.
Considering how closely the show used the book, that alone should be enough of an indication to the book’s quality. Adaptations are hard – they usually fail in many cases, especially in the book to movie/show format. Things that are changed for the sake of the show’s needs, etc.; however, this book’s quality needed very few changes.
I listened to this book on Audible. I thought this was a great story! This book is about a girl who started out in an orphanage and found something she was good at. She was looked down upon and was told she couldn’t do it, but did it. However, it would have been better if she didn’t have to depend on drugs and alcohol. But that is part of life. I do like the part of it empowering young girls though. Now I am going to watch the show on Netflix to compare. I definitely recommend this to read/listen to.
Loved it even though I had already seen the show!
Even though I understand the rudiments of chess, the descriptions of the chess games were not only over my head, but too detailed. I could also have done without the drugs.
The Queen’s Gambit by Walter Tevis was given to me as a gift. It is also a Netflix series which I knew nothing about when I received this book. I can honestly say I probably wouldn’t have chosen this book on my own. But I can also honestly say that it’s this book that I will still remember and think about months from now.
Elizabeth (Beth) Harmon became an orphan at age eight. With no relatives, she was sent to Methuen Home, an orphanage in Kentucky. She was alone and scared. The orphanage used little green pills to calm the children and Beth began to depend on those pills a little too much. It was the orphanage’s janitor that introduced Beth to the game of chess. A game she would soon discover she had a talent for.
It would be about five years before Beth was able to leave the orphanage. Now Beth was able to truly study chess and at age thirteen entered her first tournament. This event began both the rise and the fall of Beth Harmon. She was indeed a prodigy. She had a natural intuition for the game. But she also struggled with anxiety. With a feeling of not belonging. A feeling that those little green pills helped to ease. And later, she discovered alcohol did as well.
I can honestly say that this book haunted me. Last night I had to stop around eighty percent because it was late. But found I couldn’t sleep, thinking about Beth and what would happen with the particular situation she was in. I also want to say that some may think of Beth as being weak due to her dependencies. But I think she was unbelievably strong. She was completely alone. She clawed and fought her way up in the chess world. She studied all the players, read books, memorized past matches. She had one goal, to beat the best player of all at the biggest match of all, in Russia.
I pretty much went into this blind. I knew it was about chess and that it had become a television series. I did not expect the impact it would have. It’s obvious that the author did a lot of research regarding chess, chess players, and play strategies. There was a lot of detail of Beth’s chess plays and I did end up skimming a little bit through some of these since I’m not a chess player and I didn’t understand them. I just needed to know the outcome for Beth and what was going to happen next.
During the time’s I needed to set this book down for whatever reason, I thought constantly about Beth. And it’s Beth that I’ll be thinking about months from now. This is one of those books that stays with you. If at some future time I become a Netflix subscriber, I’ll definitely watch the series. But for now, perhaps the book or series will initiate new interest in the game of chess.
I’m not surprised that it was made into a show. Her character wasn’t warm and relatable, in fact the opposite, but I wanted her to succeed.
First, an admission: I watched the show before reading the novel.
I found both very good AND different. I think the show tightened the story a bit, making it stronger in some respects. But the book felt more immersive. Even as I knew how the story played out as I was reading it, it didn’t diminish my enjoyment of the book.
So in summary — somethings were better in the book, some were better in the show.
Not being a chess player I found myself skipping over many parts.
I was so enthralled by the Netflix series based on “The Queen’s Gambit” by Walter Tevis, I had to read the book. It’s such a great, unique premise—a young orphan girl being instinctively drawn into a chess obsession after watching the orphanage’s janitor reenacting games in the basement.
Sometimes books don’t translate well into film versions, but having seen the series first, I can say I wasn’t disappointed in either medium. The series was very faithful to the book, and the writing was every bit as compelling as the film version, which had the benefit of showing, as opposed to just telling.
Beth Harmon is an unlikely heroine, but her strengths are what I found so compelling. She’s got everything stacked against her, but she discovers she possesses a talent and a skill that set her apart from everyone else. She’s a masterful creation, a character that stirs our emotions while taking us on a cerebral and physically taxing, breakneck ride. Whatever Beth was going through, whatever highs she felt and whatever depths she plumbed, the reader gets to experience it all in a way that rings true. It’s an awesome tale, and very inspiring.
I had seen the film and enjoyed it. The book showing up on Book Bub was a given. I have been a chess player since school and the game has always fascinated me. I did not learn from the caretaker but other children, maybe I would have been a better player if I had learned from the caretaker. The film follows the book quite closely and even if one cannot play chess it is still a great read
Long and tedious. Especially if you don’t understand chess
Although I know almost nothing about chess, I really enjoyed the book. The characters were great and the story telling.
I watched the Netflex series first, then read the book. I must say that both are fantastic– but the book is a bit more informative of her thought process. Chess is not my thing, but the reader doesn’t need to know anything about chess to be drawn into its world and the time period the story is set in. A true “feel good” read.
Loved this book!
I loved this book because chess fascinates me by its mathematical influence.
Not for everyone.
Rarely does a book qualify as one I can’t put down, but this one did.
I saw the Netflicks series first. Of course the screenwriters added things to fill out the story to make up a whole series. The book is more compact, but a well-written and engrossing work.
Interesting characters, but page after page describing the various chess moves and the “what if I made this move instead”, or replaying the tournament games from years before as she studied them in books. I found myself skipping these parts which took up half the book because I was much more interested in the characters and storyline. Maybe a more advanced chess player would appreciate it more. I will watch the series, however.
This was a very interesting book about a young girl coping quite well with a bum lot in life. She’s let down by a lot of very immature adults and not well educated, but manages to se of-educate herself to become a world class chess master.