Blog Tour: The Last Gambit, by Om Swami

Welcome to the blog tour for 
The Last Gambit,

sponsored by

YA Bound Book Tours  
and hosted by Garima Om!!

For my stop, I'm featuring  an 
excerpt with mini-review!

 

The Last Gambit

Om Swami

Trade Paperback Edition, 208 pages

Black Lotus

January 25, 2017

Kindle Edition, 210 pages

Black Lotus

February 1, 2017

Chess, Contemporary Fiction, Diverse Reads,

Young Adult Fiction

 Success by design is infinitely better than a win by chance. Vasu Bhatt is fourteen years old when a mysterious old man spots him at a chess tournament and offers to coach him, on two simple but strange conditions: he would not accompany his student to tournaments, and there was to be no digging into his past. Initially resentful, Vasu begins to gradually understand his master’s mettle. Over eight years, master and student come to love and respect each other, but the two conditions remain unbroken – until Vasu confronts and provokes the old man. Meanwhile, their hard work and strategy pay off: Vasu qualifies for the world chess championship. But can he make it all the way without his master by his side? Inspiring, moving and mercurial, The Last Gambit is a beautiful coming of age tale in a uniquely Indian context.

Note

This mini-review is of the excerpt below, and 

not of the entire book.

This sure looks like a fascinating novel! I've never read or heard of anything even remotely like this. I have always been curious about chess, but I know it's a very complex game of strategic skill, requiring a lot of focus and patience, which I don't have much of, lol. So I definitely admire those who do! 

This novel will afford me a look at how a chess champion thinks, as well as how such a person trains to win through brilliant, well-thought out moves. And who knows? Maybe reading this book will REALLY motivate me to start cultivating the necessary patience to learn this game! 

  ‘You are a genius, Vasu,’ he said. ‘I’m investing all my time in you because I know some day you’ll surprise everyone, including yourself.’ My chest swelled with pride. ‘And that day is not far,’ he added. I felt as if I had won the world championship. He thinks I’m a genius! I couldn’t contain my smile and adjusted myself in my couch. ‘But,’ he said, gently bringing me down a notch, ‘you are not consistent. You do play some brilliant moves, but they don’t add up.’ As always, he had a nugget of wisdom. ‘Every move, Vasu, every move must put greater pressure on your opponent. To win, you must play good moves and do so consistently.’ ‘The same goes in life too,’ he continued. ‘A consistent and persistent man of average intelligence is more likely to succeed than an erratic and lazy genius. A hundred well played draws, or a hundred lost but well-fought games are better than one victory by fluke. Success by design is infinitely better than a win by chance.’

Success by design is infinitely better than a win by chance – this got etched in my mind. This was it. The missing link. I had been playing in the hope that success would come, that it would just happen. It dawned on me that success was a sculpture that I had to carve and chisel at patiently. I had to design my success.

Purchase Links

Amazon  US/Amazon UK

Amazon CA

Om Swami is a monk who lives in a remote place in the Himalayan foothills.

He holds an MBA from University of Technology, Sydney and a Bachelors in Business Computing from University of Western Sydney. Swami served in executive roles in large corporations around the world. He founded and lead a profitable software company for seven years with offices in San Francisco, New York, Toronto, London, Sydney and India.

Om Swami completely renounced his business interests to pursue a more spiritual life.

Goodreads/Amazon

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