BEST BOOKS TO LEARN CHESS FROM SCRATCH TO GRANDMASTER.!

Comprehensive Chess Course Volume I: In easy-to-use workbook format, Volume 1 takes a reader with no knowledge of chess to being a real chess player in 12 lessons. It's ideal for theachers, being used in numerous scholastic programs, but also highly effective as self-in-struction. 

Teaches the terrain of the board, how to set up the pieces and all special rules, how each piece moves, the relative value of the pieces, how to read and write chess notation and how to begin a chess game.

The final Chapter provides 20 self-tests that review and lock in wha's been learned.

Table of Contents, Volume I: 
Introduction; Lesson 1: The chessboard and the starting position; How pawns move and capture; Lesson 2: Chess notation; Lesson 3: How the Rook and Bishop move and capture. The center; Lesson 4: How the Queen and Knight move and capture; Lesson 5: How the King moves and captures. Check. Checkmate; 

Lesson 6: En passant pawn captures; Lesson 7: Castling; Lesson 8: Relative values of the chess forces; Lesson 9: How games are drawn; Lesson 10: How to record moves; Lesson 11: How to open a chess game; Lesson 12: Tests

Comprehensive Chess Course Volume II:

The work adopts methods of teaching prevalent in the Soviet Union and Europe, and rather badly needed in this country as an alternative to the catch-as-catch-can way of learning that is prevalent here. 

Table of Contents, Volume II:
Lesson 1: The Rules of Play; Lesson 2: Attack and Defense, Trades; Lesson 3: How to Start a Game, Mating with a Queen and Rook in the Endgame; Lesson 4: Mistakes in the Opening; Lesson 5: Opening Traps; 

Lesson 6: The Concept of Planning; Lesson 7: Tactics, Double Attack, Pawn Endgames; Lesson 8: Pinning, Endgames with King and two pawns versus King; Lesson 9: The Skewer; Lesson 10: Typical Mating Combinations; Lesson 11: Typical Mating Combinations (continued); Lesson 12: Tests, Afterword.

Harold Dondis, The Boston Globe: 
"Comprehensive Chess Course is a true chess course of the sort that would be formally offered in school. It is designed for a chess coach or teacher."