New In Chess Books

This is basically the NIC Yearbook app, but for books. It’s much improved from their first book app (basically a branded version of the e+ app) but the problem with improving the looks like that is it sets off flaws in sharp relief. The first and most obvious flaw is the way “Back to Book” works in the viewer. Instead of returning to the game (either beginning or end of it would be much better) it insists on returning to the start of the chapter. A second flaw is a little more subtle. If you had purchased books for use in the original book app they released, you cannot move them into this reader. So long a e+ remains workable, it’s a minor flaw, but whenever I go to buy a book, there’s a nagging question: how long before they desert this app and I lose the ability to read the book I paid for? I don’t know, and that makes me uncomfortable about either recommending the app, or buying books. There’s an auto-play function, advancing the game at a constant rate. If you’ve seen the yearbook app, or the games in the magazine app, you know how the viewer works. (Funnily enough, the magazine viewer knows how to return to the page the game was on, seems a bit sloppy to leave it out of the book viewer.) It’s the best game viewer out there, but in light of the flaws I mentioned, I can’t do better than “meh” for a recommendation. My guess is the first flaw will be fixed soon, it was probably just something they missed in testing. Unfortunately, I don’t have the same high expectations for the second. Too many e-publishers have decided every single variety of e-book should be treated as yet another profit center (I’ve even seen some, not NIC, try to sell the exact same book to me a second time.) So take the caution, you don’t own anything you’re buying for this app, and you may have to repurchase everything in the future. If you’re OK with that, raise it a star. I’m not, so I didn’t.

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Hard to believe this app is 2 yeas old. App makes me reload the book I’m reading every time I open it. Actually tries to make me buy the book every time I open the app and that is really annoying. Also there is no way to bookmark where one is app in reading. That is extremely disappointing, please fix it. Last but not least your app does not sync with other devices by way of the iCloud like a Kindle or Apple iBooks please put this on your list of things to do as soon as possible. Fix those 3 things and this would be a five-star app and I would be happy to review it again at that time.

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Even though I purchased a book from the website, I get asked to restore previous purchases from the Apple Store every time I try to open the book. Then it says no Apple Store purchases to restore, and then I get kicked out of the book, even if I am logged in with my NIC account. Sent an email to support, no response a week later. Avoid this app.

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This is a great design and New in Chess has a nice introduction to the Chess Book app marketplace. The one fatal flaw with this app, and the reason I am giving it 2 Stars verses 5, is because it cannot remember where I left off in the book. Instead, it takes me back to the front cover, then scroll until I reach the table of contents, and then remember where in the giant chapter I left off making this very difficult to just pick up and read without reviewing older material. A simple bookmark and/or highlighter system would easily fix this and greatly increase my star rating to 4 or 5. Again, the interface is beautiful, and I like the idea of either reading the book as it is in PDF form or popping a game out to the integrated board.