The Queen's gambit

Beth Harmon is eight years old and an orphan in Kentucky. She thinks of herself as plain and ordinary, and the orphanage days of routine leave her dull and restless. The children are given tranquilizers each day, and Beth starts saving them up to dull the ache.

She is a strong math student, and that earns her the job of cleaning blackboard erasers in the basement. There she finds the janitor playing chess alone. He is a sour old man who ignores her until she points out a move he could have made. She has picked up the basics just by watching, and he agrees to teach her the finer points, one step at a time.

Chess changes how her mind works, and the dullness gives way to something else: she is a prodigy. By sixteen she has been adopted, has more freedom than she ever had in the orphanage, and is entering the US Open. International fame is within reach.

The obstacles are her own. Beth has to decide whether chess comes first, ahead of her addictions and the distractions of being young. This is a coming-of-age novel about a gifted girl. It follows her from a bleak institution to the competitive circuit, with a focus on her single-minded talent and the habits that could undo it.