Rating: 
Summary: Books like this aren't made anymore
Review: Alekhine explains his reasoning at the board, with a brusque sort of pananche behind it.The analysis may be faulty at times. (This is understandable, as unlike today's authors, Alekhine didn't have a computer checking his work.) But the clarity of his logic , as well as his slightly sharpened pen (talking of an opponent's move: "This move is not a whit better than those which precede it.") make this book instructive and enjoyable to read.
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Summary: Always ready to attack, you never saw it coming from Alekhin
Review: Alekhine invented "attack preconditions without commitment," an essential concept of modern players. This is why Botvinnik insisted it is essential to study Alekhine. It's miraculous to watch Alehine increase his readiness to attack the King while at the same time being ready to attack ANYWHERE. Of course, this is a wonderful book just to enjoy, since Fischer called Alekhine "the deepest player who ever lived." Meaning? Fantastic combinations explode at any moment! How do you create a safe, flexible position that can suddenly turn into a whirlwind attack? Read this book and find out!
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Summary: Great collection of games and analysis from the best!
Review: Alekhine is my favorite chess player. In his games each move he made was in concert with the last. He was very good at executing a sacrifice of material to gain a better position, then forcing his opponent to return the material while they are in an unpleasant position and next forcing their resignation with a knock out combination! There are many examples of this in his book. He was very well versed in all phases of the game and gave very deep analysis in this book that flaunt these skills. This is a must have for all!
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Summary: Excellent book for middle-game improvement
Review: Alekhine was not just the strongest player of his era, but also a gifted writer. In this book, strategic themes like weak squares, pawn structures etc.. are expressed in simple plain language for the uninitiated. Guaranteed to improve one's understanding of the middle-game. This volume is also priced reasonably, as with most Dover Chess books anyway.....
Rating: 
Summary: Disgraceful
Review: As others have mentioned, Alekhine's analysis is highly unobjective. He often neglects to mention defensive oversights by his opponents in order to make a dubious attack seem like a forced win. Furthermore, his opening analysis is incredibly weak in this book. Many of the lines he criticises harshly are now considered the "book." It almost seems that the more rudely he treats a line, the more respect that line currently receives. But the most appalling thing of all is that a good number of games have been doctored or made up out of whole cloth. Just a few of the most egregious examples:
Volume 1 --
(1) On page 69, he discusses a game he played as White in Moscow 1915 which ended with 5 queens on the board. In fact, his opponent Grigoriev had White, and the game provided never happened (White played 11.O-O-O, not 11.NPxP). The line he cites as the game actually come from an analysis of the game.
(2) On page 79, he changes the ending of the game. The game proceeded 36....QN5 not 36....BR5!
(3) On page 84, he claims Mieses resigned. In fact the game went on an additional 15 moves.
(4) On page 107, he changes the move order to highlight some analysis.
(5) On page 109, he claims he played 27.QK3! In fact, he played a weaker move and the game dragged on 21 more moves.
(6) On page 240, he cites a game Alekhine-Tenner 1907 which never took place.
Volume 2 --
(7) On page 250, he changes the ending of the game. He had played the weaker 22....PxB not 22....QxB leading to mate. Utterly disgraceful.
Rating:
Summary: Disgraceful
Review: As others have mentioned, Alekhine's analysis is highly unobjective. He often neglects to mention defensive oversights by his opponents in order to make a dubious attack seem like a forced win. Furthermore, his opening analysis is incredibly weak in this book. Many of the lines he criticises harshly are now considered the "book." It almost seems that the more rudely he treats a line, the more respect that line currently receives. But the most appalling thing of all is that a good number of games have been doctored or made up out of whole cloth. Just a few of the most egregious examples:
Volume 1 --
(1) On page 69, he discusses a game he played as White in Moscow 1915 which ended with 5 queens on the board. In fact, his opponent Grigoriev had White, and the game provided never happened (White played 11.O-O-O, not 11.NPxP). The line he cites as the game actually come from an analysis of the game.
(2) On page 79, he changes the ending of the game. The game proceeded 36....QN5 not 36....BR5!
(3) On page 84, he claims Mieses resigned. In fact the game went on an additional 15 moves.
(4) On page 107, he changes the move order to highlight some analysis.
(5) On page 109, he claims he played 27.QK3! In fact, he played a weaker move and the game dragged on 21 more moves.
(6) On page 240, he cites a game Alekhine-Tenner 1907 which never took place.
Volume 2 --
(7) On page 250, he changes the ending of the game. He had played the weaker 22....PxB not 22....QxB leading to mate. Utterly disgraceful.
Rating:
Summary: Great Book...
Review: First to warn the frail minded about the notation in this book... If you can't deal with descriptive notation than beware of this :)... Still even if you can't figure out what the moves mean... Just reading the book is rather interesting, also its 2 books in 1... The price is rather affordable for just about anyone... The writing style is rather easy to follow and at times give the reader insight into what his thoughts were... I know many say he had ties to certain people and all this... This book is about his chess and mostly what he did at the chess board... The name Alekhine Defense I think is sorta confusing since not many if any of those games are in this book... From name you would think that he played it lot more often than he actually did... So do not get this book thinking your gonna learn that defense :)... Granted the cover isnt the best color, nor is the picture the best... Still its not a bad book to leave on your coffee table or something... Ive not read my book in a while at all... Yet I see it at least once a day, just one of those classic books... Im not really sure this book will help your game to be honest... Still just reading his words I find rather interesting... Many remember him as beating the one who many still think was best ever... Sadly he died before giving Capablanca a rematch, so people speculate he would of lost and got lucky... Also I think Alekhine was the one that brought preparation to new levels in chess... So I guess many could hate him for that reason... Just think of this book as part of history... If you wish to read and learn a bit and feel what it was like... That choice is up to you...
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Summary: Indispensable
Review: I am working throught this book presently. I have had it since '95 and each time I come back to it I am more blown away by how great it is. The only negative--and it has nothing to do with the quality of the book--is that there aren't a lot of Sicilians and King's Indians, so we don't really know how the great man would have dealt with those. This book represents one of the best values on the market, at 500-some pages at around ten bucks. If you don't have this book, you cannot be said to have a chess library.
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Summary: Hubner refutes Alekhine, for total objectivity
Review: I'll be brief with what other reviewers are correct about:
indeed, the price is attractive, and after all, this is a world champion's annotations. About 20 years ago, you couldn't beat him for readability, along with Bronstein's Zurich 1953 and Botvinnik's 100 best games... Alekhine also commented on a couple of tournaments in the 20's and 30's in a style similar to this book, and they had their place in the sun then. I have owned this book for years, and I attribute my too-daring playing style to Alekhine's unobjectivity. If you really want to know the truth, Hubner has a CD that mercilessly refutes much of the myth of Alekhine's perfection. IF you are on a budget, buy this book. I just wanted to add some balance to what I see as uniform, uncritical agreement--I've scanned the top selling books at amazon.com for chess and only My System and this book seem out of place so far (they should be lower, read my review on My System). PS Beretorn had some useful things to say in his review, I'm amazed that people give reviewers negative feedback--indeed, the descriptive notation is bothersome for many readers, Alekhine's Defense's absence is relevant, and the best part, "I'm not sure this book will help you" will aid the buyer in differentiating far more than uninformed fawning...however, I would not give it 5 stars. 3 stars, but 2 to counteract all these ridiculous fives. I have your chess development at heart, so please, take what you can from this review. I hope I've helped.
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Summary: One of The Magnificent Seven!
Review: If I have to live on an island without seven women, ;); then this book is surely one of the seven (I have selected some and am working on completeion of the rest seven) chessbooks I will bring along (one for each day)! Certainly it ranks in the top four. I agree that for this valuable collection of games, this price is SO GOOD (Maybe I need to buy another one for collector's item like my Irving Chernev "The most instructive games..."!!!
Whenever I need to prepare for the same chess opponent who gives me problem all the time, I always come back to those games between him and Capablanca. How rich and deep his and analyses are! To win 6 games from the "invincible" Capablanca, only God can! And Alekhine is closest to THE ONE that you can get and learn from. The book has only 5 games, I had to search the Internet to find the last game, and see that he was right no including that game in "My best..." Capa got his R pinned to his K late middle-game, so the whole endgame he played with one man short (But think about that: Who else could do it to Capa?!?) Then those beautiful games between him and Nimzovitsch, Bogoljubov, Reti, etc. How could someone play the chess fellows like cat-and-mouse game but Alekhine? And those tactics and trap he set for them! About half of a dozen of times, I just followed his pattern of setting traps and tactics, I won a couple of pawns, and "the rest is a matter technique"... ;)
My suggestion: Get the books for yourself and for woman (or women ;).) before your opponents do or the publisher changes the price.
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