Press Release: Endgame by Frank Brady
Penny Simon, Executive Publicist
(865) 675-1705
“The teenage prodigy, the eccentric champion, the irascible anti-Semite, the genius, the pathetic paranoid—these and other Bobby Fischers strut and fret their hour upon celebrity’s stage . . . Informed, thorough, sympathetic and surpassingly sad.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“The Mozart of the chessboard is inseparable from the monster of paranoid egotism in this fascinating biography. Brady gives us a vivid, tragic narrative of a life that became a chess game.”
—Publishers Weekly (starred; Pick of the Week)
“Not only is [Brady] a seasoned biographer and someone who knew Fischer on a personal level, he’s also an accomplished chess player himself, able to convey the game’s intricacies to the reader in a clear, uncomplicated manner. The book should appeal to a broad audience, from hard-core chess fans to casual players to those who are simply interested in what is a compelling personal story.”
—Booklist
In 1972, the world was enthralled with a not-yet-thirty-year-old chess prodigy born to a homeless mother. Featured on the cover of magazines such as Time, LIFE, Newsweek, Sports Illustrated, and the New York Times Magazine, Bobby Fischer was acknowledged to be the most famous man on Earth. How, then, did he end his life a notorious—and perhaps insane—recluse living in Iceland? ENDGAME: Bobby Fischer’s Remarkable Rise and Fall—from America’s Brightest Prodigy to the Edge of Madness (on sale February 1) by acclaimed biographer Frank Brady traces the meteoric ascent—and confounding descent—of the enigmatic genius.
Only Brady could have written ENDGAME. The two met when Fischer was a child, and their lives intertwined both personally and professionally over the course of decades. They played hundreds of games together, traveled to tournaments, dined together, and walked the streets of Manhattan for hours on end. Brady was also a privileged official witness to Fischer’s greatness, serving as a director of one of the first rated tournaments Fischer played in as a child, acting as arbiter for some of his later tournaments, and even witnessing firsthand his months-long World Championship match in Iceland. Brady also draws from Fischer family archives, recently released FBI files, and Bobby’s own e-mails to limn the arc of Fischer’s entire life.
Whether one admires or despises Bobby Fischer—and as Brady readily admits, it’s quite easy to do both simultaneously—his sheer brilliance on the chessboard is undisputed. Who was Bobby Fischer, and what does his life say about the double-edged sword of genius and the distorting effects of fame? In ENDGAME, Brady gives us the fascinating answer.