Today’s guest on Cover Stories with Chess Life is the author of our September cover story on the Prague Chess Festival and, as of the September 2021 FIDE rating list, the 26th ranked player in the world. The winner of the 2018 U.S. Championship and a stalwart on American international teams, Grandmaster Sam Shankland has already, at age 29, done almost everything there is to do in chess. He has written books for Quality Chess and the Chessable platform. He has been a second for Grandmaster Magnus Carlsen. He even appeared on a reality TV show, “Kicking and Screaming,” where he and partner Caleb Garmany survived the initial cuts but were eliminated on the second episode. Shankland’s Prague performance is chronicled in our September issue, but his magical World Cup run, where he fell to GM Sergey Karjakin in the quarterfinals after defeating Jobava, Areschenko, Jumabaeyev and Svidler, is a must-read part of our October issue. He also just participated in the Saint Louis Rapid and Blitz, and the Sinquefield Cup, and I’m sure he’ll have more to say about both of those events today.