2022 The Best Mystery Stories of the Year by Sara Paretsky Otto Penzler

Author:Sara Paretsky, Otto Penzler [Sara Paretsky, Otto Penzler]
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

PART TWO: THE MIDDLEGAME

In another of Murakami’s games his opponent lost it all in the middlegame. Not because Olsen played badly, but because he was under pressure after falling into the Murakami Trap in the opening. The pleasant-mannered but always silent Olsen had used up valuable time in trying to work out his response and it left him struggling against the clock as well as Murakami’s strongly positioned and numerically superior major pieces. A frequently rehearsed argument revolves around the issue of whether Olsen sacrificed his queen, or Murakami took it. Most people, myself included, think it obvious that Olsen would not voluntarily have sacrificed her, and that all he achieved when Murakami took the piece was a postponement of the inevitable. In an ordinary game Olsen would have resigned and handed the victory to Murakami, but in lightning chess there’s always the chance your opponent will be stressed into making a catastrophic mistake. So Olsen chose to suffer on and allow himself to be cut up, piece by piece; all the while his one remaining black knight hopped about like a headless chicken. Playing that game over again, move by painful move, was like enduring a Greek tragedy. You know how it’s going to end; the object is only to find the most beautiful way of getting there, what the drivers call the scenic route.

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