One of the best books I have read, 04 Oct 2008
This is one of the best books I have read, it makes you re-evaluate your life and see that it is for now - not later as later may never come. He does go a bit too much ionto what he thinks you should do with your free time but overall loads to gain from this this book. It is especially suited to those who have an online business like he does and most of the reference companies are American so that foe me was a downside as if there were UK reference companies for outside fullfillment etc that would make it more worthwhile however worth buying and defo gives a different perspective to life and what it can be.

There is one poem in there towards the end that I thought was so powerfull, I have typed up and put on me fridge !!

The 4-Hour Work Week, 16 Sep 2008
After reading the reviews and skimming the book in a local bookstore I bought this book.
To be honest it isn't a bad read and some tips (like leaving a message on your email, focusing on outcomes before you have a meeting and outsourcing where possible) were quite interesting but the main drawback seemed to me that it was really just a book for management and sale people not real producers and "wealth creators"
If you are a factory worker making cars, computers widgets etc you have to be there full time you can't outsource that work.
If you are a doctor you need to be there more than 4 hours a week
A teacher, nurse, shop worker, bus driver, airline pilot (the list goes on and on) can't expect to be paid a full salary for a 10% workload.
It just reinforces my prejudices that we really don't need managers at all!!
Remember the space ship in hitch hikers guide that was full of management gurus and telephone sanitizers-- Now they could do a 4 hour week!!

The Wealth Coach Loved The 4-Hour Work Week, 02 Sep 2008
I really liked several things about this book, not least that Tim Ferris didn't make it all sound easy, but rather, showed us why it is important to find a way to be financially free. Driven, successful people often find it hard to just lie on a beach, and how would you just take off on your own if you have always had people around you.....it sort of put me off a bit - which could have been sabotaging my long term success! I've always struggled with the idea of what to do when I no longer have to stay in the UK, when the kids are grown up, but can travel the world drawing a passive income from my business.....well, thanks to Tim, now I know what I'm going to do, I'm going to have "purposeful holidays". I'm going to go and live for 3-6 months at a time in an area I've always liked the sound of, rent apartements rather than live in hotels, and learn how to do things, speak languages, help people. How cool is that thought? I highly recommend this book which complements the other wealth creation biggies like "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" and "Think & Grow Rich", "One Minute Millionaire" etc. My only tiny niggle with the book was that Tim didn't go into too much detail about his path and challenges creating his own internet business and passive income, that would have been really interesting, but could form the basis for his next book perhaps?

A different view of work and life, 29 Aug 2008
I found this book great, not purely because of the actual content as a process to go through to reinvent your life, but more because it offeres such a different perspective and way of looking at life and people's priorities.

The process described is deceptively simple and challenging and there are some good points in there even if you don't make the whole jump. Plus there are some marevellous quotes along the way (I'm a sucker for quotations).

Reading this made me reevaluate how I prioritise work and life in general. I haven't gone the whole hog and joined the new rich (yet) but its already helped me with a more rounded view of the world and my part in it.

Creating the Life You Want to Live, 26 Aug 2008
This is an amazing book where I rediscovered the fact that life is short and not doing what you love is a waste of precious time. That being said not all jobs are rewarding or satisfying, but the energy and your self expression you bring to that job makes all the difference in the world. The ideas presented in this book are definitely not your traditional ones around the work place. Here Tim Ferris presents a whole new reality of what the work place can and has become for many people. One of discovering ways to work less hours, make more money and spent more time in activities outside of your workplace you like to do, ie traveling. You could say it's all about how you spend your time...quality vs quantity.

In reading Tim's book I was reminded of 2 brilliant authors named Ariel and Shya Kane who also present a non traditional approach to achieving and maintaining enlightenment without the previously conceived approach or need for years of working on yourself. Where you live life with a centeredness and ease no matter what life circumstances arise. The Kane's book titles include "Working on Yourself Doesnt Work: A Book about Instantaneous Transformation," "Being Here: Modern Day Tales of Enlightenment" and "How to Create a Magical Relationship." I highly recommend all these books. Life is way too short to not be living it as your heart desires.

One of the best books I have read, 04 Oct 2008
This is one of the best books I have read, it makes you re-evaluate your life and see that it is for now - not later as later may never come. He does go a bit too much ionto what he thinks you should do with your free time but overall loads to gain from this this book. It is especially suited to those who have an online business like he does and most of the reference companies are American so that foe me was a downside as if there were UK reference companies for outside fullfillment etc that would make it more worthwhile however worth buying and defo gives a different perspective to life and what it can be.

There is one poem in there towards the end that I thought was so powerfull, I have typed up and put on me fridge !!

The 4-Hour Work Week, 16 Sep 2008
After reading the reviews and skimming the book in a local bookstore I bought this book.
To be honest it isn't a bad read and some tips (like leaving a message on your email, focusing on outcomes before you have a meeting and outsourcing where possible) were quite interesting but the main drawback seemed to me that it was really just a book for management and sale people not real producers and "wealth creators"
If you are a factory worker making cars, computers widgets etc you have to be there full time you can't outsource that work.
If you are a doctor you need to be there more than 4 hours a week
A teacher, nurse, shop worker, bus driver, airline pilot (the list goes on and on) can't expect to be paid a full salary for a 10% workload.
It just reinforces my prejudices that we really don't need managers at all!!
Remember the space ship in hitch hikers guide that was full of management gurus and telephone sanitizers-- Now they could do a 4 hour week!!

The Wealth Coach Loved The 4-Hour Work Week, 02 Sep 2008
I really liked several things about this book, not least that Tim Ferris didn't make it all sound easy, but rather, showed us why it is important to find a way to be financially free. Driven, successful people often find it hard to just lie on a beach, and how would you just take off on your own if you have always had people around you.....it sort of put me off a bit - which could have been sabotaging my long term success! I've always struggled with the idea of what to do when I no longer have to stay in the UK, when the kids are grown up, but can travel the world drawing a passive income from my business.....well, thanks to Tim, now I know what I'm going to do, I'm going to have "purposeful holidays". I'm going to go and live for 3-6 months at a time in an area I've always liked the sound of, rent apartements rather than live in hotels, and learn how to do things, speak languages, help people. How cool is that thought? I highly recommend this book which complements the other wealth creation biggies like "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" and "Think & Grow Rich", "One Minute Millionaire" etc. My only tiny niggle with the book was that Tim didn't go into too much detail about his path and challenges creating his own internet business and passive income, that would have been really interesting, but could form the basis for his next book perhaps?

A different view of work and life, 29 Aug 2008
I found this book great, not purely because of the actual content as a process to go through to reinvent your life, but more because it offeres such a different perspective and way of looking at life and people's priorities.

The process described is deceptively simple and challenging and there are some good points in there even if you don't make the whole jump. Plus there are some marevellous quotes along the way (I'm a sucker for quotations).

Reading this made me reevaluate how I prioritise work and life in general. I haven't gone the whole hog and joined the new rich (yet) but its already helped me with a more rounded view of the world and my part in it.

Creating the Life You Want to Live, 26 Aug 2008
This is an amazing book where I rediscovered the fact that life is short and not doing what you love is a waste of precious time. That being said not all jobs are rewarding or satisfying, but the energy and your self expression you bring to that job makes all the difference in the world. The ideas presented in this book are definitely not your traditional ones around the work place. Here Tim Ferris presents a whole new reality of what the work place can and has become for many people. One of discovering ways to work less hours, make more money and spent more time in activities outside of your workplace you like to do, ie traveling. You could say it's all about how you spend your time...quality vs quantity.

In reading Tim's book I was reminded of 2 brilliant authors named Ariel and Shya Kane who also present a non traditional approach to achieving and maintaining enlightenment without the previously conceived approach or need for years of working on yourself. Where you live life with a centeredness and ease no matter what life circumstances arise. The Kane's book titles include "Working on Yourself Doesnt Work: A Book about Instantaneous Transformation," "Being Here: Modern Day Tales of Enlightenment" and "How to Create a Magical Relationship." I highly recommend all these books. Life is way too short to not be living it as your heart desires.

A must read for the serious investor, 06 Aug 2008
The language may be a bit dated but the advice is still good, proving there is little new in the world of investing. If you follow Graham's practical advice on valuing companies, assessing risk and investing for the long term you will make money.

Lives up to the hype, 07 Jun 2007
Most investors seem to have heard of this book - many refer to it as the bible of value investing. I think that the esteem that it is held in is probably counter productive (Barton Biggs, hedge fund manager, talks about being asked to read and annotate it twice as a young man), but what impressed me is that it is a very simple readable book that explains how to invest long term, to maximise wealth.

I don't think that Zweig's commentary adds much - I would pay more for a version with it excised - it provides interesting detail on what Graham may have considered important which is great, but it also provides a lot of anecdotal evidence which could be misleading. It also triples the length and provides a lot of distraction.

Invest In This Book, Invest In Yourself, 24 Sep 2006
With more than one million copies sold and an endorsement on the cover by Warren Buffet, you know there has to be something to this book- and I think I know why. Simply because it is the first book ever to describe the emotional framework and analytical tools necessary for financial success for individual investors.

Probably the single best book on investing written for the lay-public and the stock market bible since its first appearance in 1949, it's a great resource, although it's quite a thick book and filled with detail- and probably not for anybody but the serious stock market investor. And if getting motivated to start investing is your problem, suggest The Sixty-Second Motivator. Good luck!



Two books: one old and good, one new and bad, 21 Sep 2006
This edition of The Intelligent Investor is really two books in one. There is the original 1973 edition of Ben Graham's classic on "value investing" and then a commentary on each chapter by Jason Zweig.
Graham's text is solid, a little heavy, sometimes a little out of date, and some of his tables a bit user-unfriendly; but no matter: it is the timeless lessons he teaches that matter. He is very methodical, a bit mathematical and -- if you follow him all the way -- will leave you with a good grounding in how to approach the stock market.
Basically his gospel is this: ignore all the hype and blather around the stockmarket. Invest for the long-term in big, rock-steady, simple businesses, after analysing them with a few financial criteria. But only buy when the market is offering them at a bargain price.
Unfortunately, each of Graham's sober tutorials is followed by a commentary by Zweig. He may claim to be a disciple of the great man, but he is certainly not cut from the same cloth. Zweig is just one more financial markets cheerleader: repetitive, pushy, and rolling out the same old disaster stories from the dot.com era ad nauseam, supposedly to show how wise Graham was (in case you didn't understand Graham's chapter). He also repeatedly cites his own magazine and keeps naming the same fund, which is annoying at the very least. He also resorts to a lot of "if you had bought shares on every third Wednesday since 1974 you would have made a 3,859 percent return!!" kind of hocus-pocus which is a complete waste of time.
Zweig could have used the opportunity to unpick some of the knottier points of Graham's book and help readers understand the harder parts. The worst thing is that he sometimes goes against Graham's teachings, so he should NOT be taken as an extension of Graham! (For example, on page 129 he says if you don't have time to choose your own stocks, there's no shame in hiring someone to pick them for you. On page 243, he says "In the financial markets, luck is more important than skill". Ben Graham must be turning in his grave.)
One more caveat: this volume boasts a preface and appendix by Warren Buffett, Ben Graham's most famous pupil. But don't be swayed by that. The preface is an obituary written by Buffett and the appendix is an edited talk that Buffett gave in 1984. They're okay but it doesn't mean that Buffett is backing this schizoid volume.
My advice: read the Graham chapters, ditch the Zweig commentary. You'll save time AND be wiser.

Definitive guide to value investing, 10 Sep 2006
This is probably the best place to start if you are interested in value investing. Although the latest revision by Graham was in the seventies, Jazon Zweig adds commentaries to each chapter to bring the information right up to date. The principles of investment are sound and the style of writing is very accessible. This is a classic investment book and should be read by most people planning for their financial future. Highly recommended.

One of the best books I have read, 04 Oct 2008
This is one of the best books I have read, it makes you re-evaluate your life and see that it is for now - not later as later may never come. He does go a bit too much ionto what he thinks you should do with your free time but overall loads to gain from this this book. It is especially suited to those who have an online business like he does and most of the reference companies are American so that foe me was a downside as if there were UK reference companies for outside fullfillment etc that would make it more worthwhile however worth buying and defo gives a different perspective to life and what it can be.

There is one poem in there towards the end that I thought was so powerfull, I have typed up and put on me fridge !!

The 4-Hour Work Week, 16 Sep 2008
After reading the reviews and skimming the book in a local bookstore I bought this book.
To be honest it isn't a bad read and some tips (like leaving a message on your email, focusing on outcomes before you have a meeting and outsourcing where possible) were quite interesting but the main drawback seemed to me that it was really just a book for management and sale people not real producers and "wealth creators"
If you are a factory worker making cars, computers widgets etc you have to be there full time you can't outsource that work.
If you are a doctor you need to be there more than 4 hours a week
A teacher, nurse, shop worker, bus driver, airline pilot (the list goes on and on) can't expect to be paid a full salary for a 10% workload.
It just reinforces my prejudices that we really don't need managers at all!!
Remember the space ship in hitch hikers guide that was full of management gurus and telephone sanitizers-- Now they could do a 4 hour week!!

The Wealth Coach Loved The 4-Hour Work Week, 02 Sep 2008
I really liked several things about this book, not least that Tim Ferris didn't make it all sound easy, but rather, showed us why it is important to find a way to be financially free. Driven, successful people often find it hard to just lie on a beach, and how would you just take off on your own if you have always had people around you.....it sort of put me off a bit - which could have been sabotaging my long term success! I've always struggled with the idea of what to do when I no longer have to stay in the UK, when the kids are grown up, but can travel the world drawing a passive income from my business.....well, thanks to Tim, now I know what I'm going to do, I'm going to have "purposeful holidays". I'm going to go and live for 3-6 months at a time in an area I've always liked the sound of, rent apartements rather than live in hotels, and learn how to do things, speak languages, help people. How cool is that thought? I highly recommend this book which complements the other wealth creation biggies like "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" and "Think & Grow Rich", "One Minute Millionaire" etc. My only tiny niggle with the book was that Tim didn't go into too much detail about his path and challenges creating his own internet business and passive income, that would have been really interesting, but could form the basis for his next book perhaps?

A different view of work and life, 29 Aug 2008
I found this book great, not purely because of the actual content as a process to go through to reinvent your life, but more because it offeres such a different perspective and way of looking at life and people's priorities.

The process described is deceptively simple and challenging and there are some good points in there even if you don't make the whole jump. Plus there are some marevellous quotes along the way (I'm a sucker for quotations).

Reading this made me reevaluate how I prioritise work and life in general. I haven't gone the whole hog and joined the new rich (yet) but its already helped me with a more rounded view of the world and my part in it.

Creating the Life You Want to Live, 26 Aug 2008
This is an amazing book where I rediscovered the fact that life is short and not doing what you love is a waste of precious time. That being said not all jobs are rewarding or satisfying, but the energy and your self expression you bring to that job makes all the difference in the world. The ideas presented in this book are definitely not your traditional ones around the work place. Here Tim Ferris presents a whole new reality of what the work place can and has become for many people. One of discovering ways to work less hours, make more money and spent more time in activities outside of your workplace you like to do, ie traveling. You could say it's all about how you spend your time...quality vs quantity.

In reading Tim's book I was reminded of 2 brilliant authors named Ariel and Shya Kane who also present a non traditional approach to achieving and maintaining enlightenment without the previously conceived approach or need for years of working on yourself. Where you live life with a centeredness and ease no matter what life circumstances arise. The Kane's book titles include "Working on Yourself Doesnt Work: A Book about Instantaneous Transformation," "Being Here: Modern Day Tales of Enlightenment" and "How to Create a Magical Relationship." I highly recommend all these books. Life is way too short to not be living it as your heart desires.

A must read for the serious investor, 06 Aug 2008
The language may be a bit dated but the advice is still good, proving there is little new in the world of investing. If you follow Graham's practical advice on valuing companies, assessing risk and investing for the long term you will make money.

Lives up to the hype, 07 Jun 2007
Most investors seem to have heard of this book - many refer to it as the bible of value investing. I think that the esteem that it is held in is probably counter productive (Barton Biggs, hedge fund manager, talks about being asked to read and annotate it twice as a young man), but what impressed me is that it is a very simple readable book that explains how to invest long term, to maximise wealth.

I don't think that Zweig's commentary adds much - I would pay more for a version with it excised - it provides interesting detail on what Graham may have considered important which is great, but it also provides a lot of anecdotal evidence which could be misleading. It also triples the length and provides a lot of distraction.

Invest In This Book, Invest In Yourself, 24 Sep 2006
With more than one million copies sold and an endorsement on the cover by Warren Buffet, you know there has to be something to this book- and I think I know why. Simply because it is the first book ever to describe the emotional framework and analytical tools necessary for financial success for individual investors.

Probably the single best book on investing written for the lay-public and the stock market bible since its first appearance in 1949, it's a great resource, although it's quite a thick book and filled with detail- and probably not for anybody but the serious stock market investor. And if getting motivated to start investing is your problem, suggest The Sixty-Second Motivator. Good luck!



Two books: one old and good, one new and bad, 21 Sep 2006
This edition of The Intelligent Investor is really two books in one. There is the original 1973 edition of Ben Graham's classic on "value investing" and then a commentary on each chapter by Jason Zweig.
Graham's text is solid, a little heavy, sometimes a little out of date, and some of his tables a bit user-unfriendly; but no matter: it is the timeless lessons he teaches that matter. He is very methodical, a bit mathematical and -- if you follow him all the way -- will leave you with a good grounding in how to approach the stock market.
Basically his gospel is this: ignore all the hype and blather around the stockmarket. Invest for the long-term in big, rock-steady, simple businesses, after analysing them with a few financial criteria. But only buy when the market is offering them at a bargain price.
Unfortunately, each of Graham's sober tutorials is followed by a commentary by Zweig. He may claim to be a disciple of the great man, but he is certainly not cut from the same cloth. Zweig is just one more financial markets cheerleader: repetitive, pushy, and rolling out the same old disaster stories from the dot.com era ad nauseam, supposedly to show how wise Graham was (in case you didn't understand Graham's chapter). He also repeatedly cites his own magazine and keeps naming the same fund, which is annoying at the very least. He also resorts to a lot of "if you had bought shares on every third Wednesday since 1974 you would have made a 3,859 percent return!!" kind of hocus-pocus which is a complete waste of time.
Zweig could have used the opportunity to unpick some of the knottier points of Graham's book and help readers understand the harder parts. The worst thing is that he sometimes goes against Graham's teachings, so he should NOT be taken as an extension of Graham! (For example, on page 129 he says if you don't have time to choose your own stocks, there's no shame in hiring someone to pick them for you. On page 243, he says "In the financial markets, luck is more important than skill". Ben Graham must be turning in his grave.)
One more caveat: this volume boasts a preface and appendix by Warren Buffett, Ben Graham's most famous pupil. But don't be swayed by that. The preface is an obituary written by Buffett and the appendix is an edited talk that Buffett gave in 1984. They're okay but it doesn't mean that Buffett is backing this schizoid volume.
My advice: read the Graham chapters, ditch the Zweig commentary. You'll save time AND be wiser.

Definitive guide to value investing, 10 Sep 2006
This is probably the best place to start if you are interested in value investing. Although the latest revision by Graham was in the seventies, Jazon Zweig adds commentaries to each chapter to bring the information right up to date. The principles of investment are sound and the style of writing is very accessible. This is a classic investment book and should be read by most people planning for their financial future. Highly recommended.

Excellent Book, 18 Sep 2008
This book has full of practical trading tips and summarises the top ten mistakes made by traders. The book is written in plain English, so it's easy to understand and good fun to read too. I have found this book is very useful in my trading.


Without doubt..., 01 Sep 2008
.... the best book currently around for understanding the stock market. Robbie Burns is very good at explaining all the market jargon in a friendly and humourous tone, and there's masses of advice - particularly what not to do! The webiste is well worth a look too.

good book easy to read, 20 Jul 2008
good book easy to read, emphasises doing own research. Gives some usefull advice, such as avoiding shares with debt more than 3 times of Annual profit ( I would say rather Cash Flow)


Only regret is not buying it soon enough, 12 May 2008
I wish I bought it a year ago when I started trading... If I read this earlier, I could have avoided mistakes I made NT pointed out in the book.
The author's writing style is light and friendly so it's not a boring book to read. Clearly pointed out mistakes all newbie investors would make along with good habit of trading. It's not the investing bible nor get rich quick book but it definitely is investing 101 for newbies and intermediate investors.

Great., 05 Mar 2008
Although I have yet to find the time, spare cash or the confidence to start trading I do think that this book will prove invaluable to me when I finally do. The advice is not going to guarantee you a fortune over night or even guarantee you success. However it will make the whole world of stocks and shares much less of a mystery whilst providing you with some very useful hints tips and information. Looking over some of my friend's dealings and losses I now understand approximately where they may have gone wrong. Had they read this book first they may have saved themselves some money. Even such seemingly simple advice about setting loss stops and never buying into the `falling knife' stocks is very helpful. The author includes many examples of winning and losing scenarios as well as pointers on where deals often go wrong.
As other reviewers have said the book is very easy to read in a sitting or two, and also amusing in places.
I will be passing this on to my unsuccessful share dealing friends, and recommend it to anyone still in their early days of dealing.

One of the best books I have read, 04 Oct 2008
This is one of the best books I have read, it makes you re-evaluate your life and see that it is for now - not later as later may never come. He does go a bit too much ionto what he thinks you should do with your free time but overall loads to gain from this this book. It is especially suited to those who have an online business like he does and most of the reference companies are American so that foe me was a downside as if there were UK reference companies for outside fullfillment etc that would make it more worthwhile however worth buying and defo gives a different perspective to life and what it can be.

There is one poem in there towards the end that I thought was so powerfull, I have typed up and put on me fridge !!

The 4-Hour Work Week, 16 Sep 2008
After reading the reviews and skimming the book in a local bookstore I bought this book.
To be honest it isn't a bad read and some tips (like leaving a message on your email, focusing on outcomes before you have a meeting and outsourcing where possible) were quite interesting but the main drawback seemed to me that it was really just a book for management and sale people not real producers and "wealth creators"
If you are a factory worker making cars, computers widgets etc you have to be there full time you can't outsource that work.
If you are a doctor you need to be there more than 4 hours a week
A teacher, nurse, shop worker, bus driver, airline pilot (the list goes on and on) can't expect to be paid a full salary for a 10% workload.
It just reinforces my prejudices that we really don't need managers at all!!
Remember the space ship in hitch hikers guide that was full of management gurus and telephone sanitizers-- Now they could do a 4 hour week!!

The Wealth Coach Loved The 4-Hour Work Week, 02 Sep 2008
I really liked several things about this book, not least that Tim Ferris didn't make it all sound easy, but rather, showed us why it is important to find a way to be financially free. Driven, successful people often find it hard to just lie on a beach, and how would you just take off on your own if you have always had people around you.....it sort of put me off a bit - which could have been sabotaging my long term success! I've always struggled with the idea of what to do when I no longer have to stay in the UK, when the kids are grown up, but can travel the world drawing a passive income from my business.....well, thanks to Tim, now I know what I'm going to do, I'm going to have "purposeful holidays". I'm going to go and live for 3-6 months at a time in an area I've always liked the sound of, rent apartements rather than live in hotels, and learn how to do things, speak languages, help people. How cool is that thought? I highly recommend this book which complements the other wealth creation biggies like "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" and "Think & Grow Rich", "One Minute Millionaire" etc. My only tiny niggle with the book was that Tim didn't go into too much detail about his path and challenges creating his own internet business and passive income, that would have been really interesting, but could form the basis for his next book perhaps?

A different view of work and life, 29 Aug 2008
I found this book great, not purely because of the actual content as a process to go through to reinvent your life, but more because it offeres such a different perspective and way of looking at life and people's priorities.

The process described is deceptively simple and challenging and there are some good points in there even if you don't make the whole jump. Plus there are some marevellous quotes along the way (I'm a sucker for quotations).

Reading this made me reevaluate how I prioritise work and life in general. I haven't gone the whole hog and joined the new rich (yet) but its already helped me with a more rounded view of the world and my part in it.

Creating the Life You Want to Live, 26 Aug 2008
This is an amazing book where I rediscovered the fact that life is short and not doing what you love is a waste of precious time. That being said not all jobs are rewarding or satisfying, but the energy and your self expression you bring to that job makes all the difference in the world. The ideas presented in this book are definitely not your traditional ones around the work place. Here Tim Ferris presents a whole new reality of what the work place can and has become for many people. One of discovering ways to work less hours, make more money and spent more time in activities outside of your workplace you like to do, ie traveling. You could say it's all about how you spend your time...quality vs quantity.

In reading Tim's book I was reminded of 2 brilliant authors named Ariel and Shya Kane who also present a non traditional approach to achieving and maintaining enlightenment without the previously conceived approach or need for years of working on yourself. Where you live life with a centeredness and ease no matter what life circumstances arise. The Kane's book titles include "Working on Yourself Doesnt Work: A Book about Instantaneous Transformation," "Being Here: Modern Day Tales of Enlightenment" and "How to Create a Magical Relationship." I highly recommend all these books. Life is way too short to not be living it as your heart desires.

A must read for the serious investor, 06 Aug 2008
The language may be a bit dated but the advice is still good, proving there is little new in the world of investing. If you follow Graham's practical advice on valuing companies, assessing risk and investing for the long term you will make money.

Lives up to the hype, 07 Jun 2007
Most investors seem to have heard of this book - many refer to it as the bible of value investing. I think that the esteem that it is held in is probably counter productive (Barton Biggs, hedge fund manager, talks about being asked to read and annotate it twice as a young man), but what impressed me is that it is a very simple readable book that explains how to invest long term, to maximise wealth.

I don't think that Zweig's commentary adds much - I would pay more for a version with it excised - it provides interesting detail on what Graham may have considered important which is great, but it also provides a lot of anecdotal evidence which could be misleading. It also triples the length and provides a lot of distraction.

Invest In This Book, Invest In Yourself, 24 Sep 2006
With more than one million copies sold and an endorsement on the cover by Warren Buffet, you know there has to be something to this book- and I think I know why. Simply because it is the first book ever to describe the emotional framework and analytical tools necessary for financial success for individual investors.

Probably the single best book on investing written for the lay-public and the stock market bible since its first appearance in 1949, it's a great resource, although it's quite a thick book and filled with detail- and probably not for anybody but the serious stock market investor. And if getting motivated to start investing is your problem, suggest The Sixty-Second Motivator. Good luck!



Two books: one old and good, one new and bad, 21 Sep 2006
This edition of The Intelligent Investor is really two books in one. There is the original 1973 edition of Ben Graham's classic on "value investing" and then a commentary on each chapter by Jason Zweig.
Graham's text is solid, a little heavy, sometimes a little out of date, and some of his tables a bit user-unfriendly; but no matter: it is the timeless lessons he teaches that matter. He is very methodical, a bit mathematical and -- if you follow him all the way -- will leave you with a good grounding in how to approach the stock market.
Basically his gospel is this: ignore all the hype and blather around the stockmarket. Invest for the long-term in big, rock-steady, simple businesses, after analysing them with a few financial criteria. But only buy when the market is offering them at a bargain price.
Unfortunately, each of Graham's sober tutorials is followed by a commentary by Zweig. He may claim to be a disciple of the great man, but he is certainly not cut from the same cloth. Zweig is just one more financial markets cheerleader: repetitive, pushy, and rolling out the same old disaster stories from the dot.com era ad nauseam, supposedly to show how wise Graham was (in case you didn't understand Graham's chapter). He also repeatedly cites his own magazine and keeps naming the same fund, which is annoying at the very least. He also resorts to a lot of "if you had bought shares on every third Wednesday since 1974 you would have made a 3,859 percent return!!" kind of hocus-pocus which is a complete waste of time.
Zweig could have used the opportunity to unpick some of the knottier points of Graham's book and help readers understand the harder parts. The worst thing is that he sometimes goes against Graham's teachings, so he should NOT be taken as an extension of Graham! (For example, on page 129 he says if you don't have time to choose your own stocks, there's no shame in hiring someone to pick them for you. On page 243, he says "In the financial markets, luck is more important than skill". Ben Graham must be turning in his grave.)
One more caveat: this volume boasts a preface and appendix by Warren Buffett, Ben Graham's most famous pupil. But don't be swayed by that. The preface is an obituary written by Buffett and the appendix is an edited talk that Buffett gave in 1984. They're okay but it doesn't mean that Buffett is backing this schizoid volume.
My advice: read the Graham chapters, ditch the Zweig commentary. You'll save time AND be wiser.

Definitive guide to value investing, 10 Sep 2006
This is probably the best place to start if you are interested in value investing. Although the latest revision by Graham was in the seventies, Jazon Zweig adds commentaries to each chapter to bring the information right up to date. The principles of investment are sound and the style of writing is very accessible. This is a classic investment book and should be read by most people planning for their financial future. Highly recommended.

Excellent Book, 18 Sep 2008
This book has full of practical trading tips and summarises the top ten mistakes made by traders. The book is written in plain English, so it's easy to understand and good fun to read too. I have found this book is very useful in my trading.


Without doubt..., 01 Sep 2008
.... the best book currently around for understanding the stock market. Robbie Burns is very good at explaining all the market jargon in a friendly and humourous tone, and there's masses of advice - particularly what not to do! The webiste is well worth a look too.

good book easy to read, 20 Jul 2008
good book easy to read, emphasises doing own research. Gives some usefull advice, such as avoiding shares with debt more than 3 times of Annual profit ( I would say rather Cash Flow)


Only regret is not buying it soon enough, 12 May 2008
I wish I bought it a year ago when I started trading... If I read this earlier, I could have avoided mistakes I made NT pointed out in the book.
The author's writing style is light and friendly so it's not a boring book to read. Clearly pointed out mistakes all newbie investors would make along with good habit of trading. It's not the investing bible nor get rich quick book but it definitely is investing 101 for newbies and intermediate investors.

Great., 05 Mar 2008
Although I have yet to find the time, spare cash or the confidence to start trading I do think that this book will prove invaluable to me when I finally do. The advice is not going to guarantee you a fortune over night or even guarantee you success. However it will make the whole world of stocks and shares much less of a mystery whilst providing you with some very useful hints tips and information. Looking over some of my friend's dealings and losses I now understand approximately where they may have gone wrong. Had they read this book first they may have saved themselves some money. Even such seemingly simple advice about setting loss stops and never buying into the `falling knife' stocks is very helpful. The author includes many examples of winning and losing scenarios as well as pointers on where deals often go wrong.
As other reviewers have said the book is very easy to read in a sitting or two, and also amusing in places.
I will be passing this on to my unsuccessful share dealing friends, and recommend it to anyone still in their early days of dealing.


How to get rich slowly, 20 Sep 2008
This is just about the best non fiction book I have ever read and most certainly the best £4 I ever spent.

There are many thousands of books out there which claim to make us millionaires over night, many of which are sold here on Amazon. But while they quite often have overall 5 star ratings, you never actually see any customer reviews informing us they did indeed become a millionaire over night. What The Richest Man In Babylon does though is instead tell us that through using common sense and a bit of self discipline, we can all become rich over time.

The synopsis is simple, through a series of very brief stories taken from recently excavated scrolls perportedly found in the ancient lost city of Babylon, you are told how to manage your money. Each little tale has one main message and pretty much all of them ring true today.

The startling thing about the success of this book for me was that there isn't actually anything new in it. The classic example of this is one of the early messages: 'Spend less than you earn and you will become rich.' Duh! Blatantly obvious really but if you think about it how many of us in this day and age actually do this? Where credit is so easy to obtain, how many of us now live beyond our means? I genuinely feel this should be given to kids and taught in schools as they are the ones who would most benefit from it.

One of the tales did stick in my throat a little bit and is slightly more difficult to apply in today's society: A chap in considerable debt who has decided to turn his life around is advised to go and see all his creditors to inform them that he is sorting it out and that they will get their money back gradually over a certain period, all the while still maintaining his 'spend less than he earns' mantra.

A good idea indeed but not very practicle in today's economy. Let's say an individual owes a large amount on their credit card and their minimum payments plus their other outgoings amount to more than they earn. (sound familiar?!) If he goes to his credit card company and says "look, sorry - I can't pay what you want each month but can give you £100 a month until it's cleared." The credit card company will probably agree to this in some form or another, after all £100 is better than nothing and this is pointed out in the book. But this kind of Individual Voluntary Arrangement today now becomes a social stigma and official black mark against our name, effectively stopping us from getting mortgages or any other type of ligitimate credit in the future.

The author of the 'scrolls' would say that this was not an issue as we should never use credit but today it is a necessary part of life and certainly about the only way most of us would be able to buy a house.

This minor quibble aside, I still wholeheartedly recommend this book to anyone who listens (and a few who don't, especially if they have kids too young to have made their parents' financial mistakes). Unlike one previous reviewer, I found the style very easy to read and even managed to get through entire chapters while waiting for my kettle to boil!

While there isn't really any true method to follow as such, I've applied the messages to my finances where possible for nearly 2 years now and have reduced my debt to a 10th of what it was and saved up a tidy few quid. I know it won't make me rich over night on it's own but I also know that I certainly won't be working for the rest of my life!

Get it, read it, follow what it says and you will become rich evetually.

Motivating a Wealth Mentality!, 25 Aug 2008
I read this book back in 1994. It has much timeless knowledge.

The Richest Man in Babylon is an inspirational book on helping to create an investment mentality by using parables of how the Richest Man in Babylon would have invested. It is for beginning investors who need good reasons to develop a proper mindset to start working towards becoming financially independent. It also is a good book for recharging a wealth mentality in any investor.

The concepts in the book are simple, but their effects on wealth are profound! For example, George Clason covers The Five Laws of Gold . From the version I read, they are:

I. Gold cometh gladly and in increasing quantities to any man who will put by not less than one-tenth of his earnings to create an estate for his future and that of his family.

II. Gold laboreth diligently and contentedly for the wise owner who finds for it profitable employment, multiplying even as the flocks in the field.

III. Gold clingeth to the protection of the cautious owner who invests it under the advice of men wise in its handling.

IV. Gold slippeth away from the man who invests it in businesses or purposes with which he is not familiar or which are not approved by those skilled in its keep.

V. Gold flees the man who would force it to impossible earnings or who followeth the alluring advice of tricksters and schemers or who trusts it to his own inexperience and romantic desires in investment.

Overall an excellent book for beginners though advanced investors.

The Re-Discovery of Common Sense: A Guide To: The Lost Art of Critical Thinking

Financial detox!, 19 Aug 2008
'The Richest Man in Babylon' is inspirational and has radically changed my outlook on my finances. It begins by using a parable about a poor man in Babylon who seeks the advice of a wealthy man to let him know the secrets of his seemingly never ending pot of gold. He discovers that these secrets are actually quite straightforward and easily put into practice, which he does with proven results. Pitfalls are overcome and all the while we are learning the core rules of accumulating wealth, maintaining wealth and, most importantly, multiplying wealth.

Although this book is set in Ancient Babylon the rules still apply today, although now we are talking about money in the bank as opposed to bars of gold or shekels in your purse! Overall this has given me a far more balanced view of my money and life in general. It almost feels like you are cleansing your soul as you read it - a sort of mind detox! So for anyone who dreads opening letters from the bank or buries their head in the sand, this book is for you!

Brilliant, 09 Aug 2008
This book is quite simply brilliant. I have bought copies for other people as presents and all of them really enjoyed it. Yes its message is simple, but simple ideas are nearly always the best. Do your self a favour and just buy it now.

Excellent, 25 Jul 2008
Very good book to help you examine your way of thinking to finance. Ideal for the beach when on holiday or a long plane flight as the book is difficult to put down, one of the few really good books on finance. The government should make this a part of the national curriculum in school to make future generations more responcible and sucessful with their own personal finances.

On September 23, 1998, the boardroom of the New York Fed was a tense place. Around the table sat the heads of every major Wall Street bank, the chairman of the New York Stock Exchange, and representatives from numerous European banks, each of whom had been summoned by the Fed to discuss the highly unusual prospect of rescuing what had, until then, been the envy of them all, the extraordinarily successful bond-trading firm of Long-Term Capital Management. Roger Lowenstein's When Genius Failed is the gripping story behind the Fed's unprecedented move, the incredible heights reached by LTCM, and its eventual dramatic demise.

Lowenstein, a financial journalist and author of Buffet: The Making of an American Capitalist, uncovers and examines the personalities, academic expertise, professional relationships, and layers of numbers behind LTCM's roller-coaster ride with the precision and knowledge of a skilled surgeon. The fund's enigmatic founder, John Meriwether, spent almost 20 years at Salomon Brothers, where he formed its renowned Arbitrage Group by hiring academia's top financial economists. Though Meriwether left Salomon under a cloud of the SEC's wrath, he leapt into his next venture with ease, and enticed most of his former Salomon hires--and eventually even David Mullins, the former vice-chairman of the US Federal Reserve--to join him in starting a hedge fund that would beat all hedge funds.

LTCM began trading in February 1994, after completing a road show that, despite the Ph.D.-touting partners' lack of social skills and their disdainful condescension of potential investors who couldn't rise to their intellectual level, netted a whopping 1.25 billion dollars. The fund would seek to earn a tiny spread on thousands of trades, "as if it were vacuuming nickels that others couldn't see," in the words of one of its Nobel laureate partners, Myron Scholes. And nickels it found. In its first two years, LTCM earned 1.6 billion dollars, profits that exceeded forty percent even after the partners' hefty cuts. By the spring of 1996 it was holding $140 billion in assets. But the end was soon in sight, and Lowenstein's detailed account of each successively worse month of 1998, culminating in a disastrous August and the partners' subsequent panicked moves, is riveting.

The arbitrageur's world is a complicated one, and it might have served Lowenstein well to slow down at the start and explain in greater detail the complex terms of the more exotic species of investment flora that cram the book's pages. However, much of the intrigue of the Long-Term story lies in its dizzying pace (not to mention the dizzying amounts of money won and lost in the fund's short lifespan), and Lowenstein's smooth, conversational, but equally urgent tone carries it along well. The book is a compelling read for those who've always wondered what lay behind the Fed's controversial involvement with the LTCM hedge-fund debacle. --S. Ketchum

One of the best books I have read, 04 Oct 2008
This is one of the best books I have read, it makes you re-evaluate your life and see that it is for now - not later as later may never come. He does go a bit too much ionto what he thinks you should do with your free time but overall loads to gain from this this book. It is especially suited to those who have an online business like he does and most of the reference companies are American so that foe me was a downside as if there were UK reference companies for outside fullfillment etc that would make it more worthwhile however worth buying and defo gives a different perspective to life and what it can be.

There is one poem in there towards the end that I thought was so powerfull, I have typed up and put on me fridge !!

The 4-Hour Work Week, 16 Sep 2008
After reading the reviews and skimming the book in a local bookstore I bought this book.
To be honest it isn't a bad read and some tips (like leaving a message on your email, focusing on outcomes before you have a meeting and outsourcing where possible) were quite interesting but the main drawback seemed to me that it was really just a book for management and sale people not real producers and "wealth creators"
If you are a factory worker making cars, computers widgets etc you have to be there full time you can't outsource that work.
If you are a doctor you need to be there more than 4 hours a week
A teacher, nurse, shop worker, bus driver, airline pilot (the list goes on and on) can't expect to be paid a full salary for a 10% workload.
It just reinforces my prejudices that we really don't need managers at all!!
Remember the space ship in hitch hikers guide that was full of management gurus and telephone sanitizers-- Now they could do a 4 hour week!!

The Wealth Coach Loved The 4-Hour Work Week, 02 Sep 2008
I really liked several things about this book, not least that Tim Ferris didn't make it all sound easy, but rather, showed us why it is important to find a way to be financially free. Driven, successful people often find it hard to just lie on a beach, and how would you just take off on your own if you have always had people around you.....it sort of put me off a bit - which could have been sabotaging my long term success! I've always struggled with the idea of what to do when I no longer have to stay in the UK, when the kids are grown up, but can travel the world drawing a passive income from my business.....well, thanks to Tim, now I know what I'm going to do, I'm going to have "purposeful holidays". I'm going to go and live for 3-6 months at a time in an area I've always liked the sound of, rent apartements rather than live in hotels, and learn how to do things, speak languages, help people. How cool is that thought? I highly recommend this book which complements the other wealth creation biggies like "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" and "Think & Grow Rich", "One Minute Millionaire" etc. My only tiny niggle with the book was that Tim didn't go into too much detail about his path and challenges creating his own internet business and passive income, that would have been really interesting, but could form the basis for his next book perhaps?

A different view of work and life, 29 Aug 2008
I found this book great, not purely because of the actual content as a process to go through to reinvent your life, but more because it offeres such a different perspective and way of looking at life and people's priorities.

The process described is deceptively simple and challenging and there are some good points in there even if you don't make the whole jump. Plus there are some marevellous quotes along the way (I'm a sucker for quotations).

Reading this made me reevaluate how I prioritise work and life in general. I haven't gone the whole hog and joined the new rich (yet) but its already helped me with a more rounded view of the world and my part in it.

Creating the Life You Want to Live, 26 Aug 2008
This is an amazing book where I rediscovered the fact that life is short and not doing what you love is a waste of precious time. That being said not all jobs are rewarding or satisfying, but the energy and your self expression you bring to that job makes all the difference in the world. The ideas presented in this book are definitely not your traditional ones around the work place. Here Tim Ferris presents a whole new reality of what the work place can and has become for many people. One of discovering ways to work less hours, make more money and spent more time in activities outside of your workplace you like to do, ie traveling. You could say it's all about how you spend your time...quality vs quantity.

In reading Tim's book I was reminded of 2 brilliant authors named Ariel and Shya Kane who also present a non traditional approach to achieving and maintaining enlightenment without the previously conceived approach or need for years of working on yourself. Where you live life with a centeredness and ease no matter what life circumstances arise. The Kane's book titles include "Working on Yourself Doesnt Work: A Book about Instantaneous Transformation," "Being Here: Modern Day Tales of Enlightenment" and "How to Create a Magical Relationship." I highly recommend all these books. Life is way too short to not be living it as your heart desires.

A must read for the serious investor, 06 Aug 2008
The language may be a bit dated but the advice is still good, proving there is little new in the world of investing. If you follow Graham's practical advice on valuing companies, assessing risk and investing for the long term you will make money.

Lives up to the hype, 07 Jun 2007
Most investors seem to have heard of this book - many refer to it as the bible of value investing. I think that the esteem that it is held in is probably counter productive (Barton Biggs, hedge fund manager, talks about being asked to read and annotate it twice as a young man), but what impressed me is that it is a very simple readable book that explains how to invest long term, to maximise wealth.

I don't think that Zweig's commentary adds much - I would pay more for a version with it excised - it provides interesting detail on what Graham may have considered important which is great, but it also provides a lot of anecdotal evidence which could be misleading. It also triples the length and provides a lot of distraction.

Invest In This Book, Invest In Yourself, 24 Sep 2006
With more than one million copies sold and an endorsement on the cover by Warren Buffet, you know there has to be something to this book- and I think I know why. Simply because it is the first book ever to describe the emotional framework and analytical tools necessary for financial success for individual investors.

Probably the single best book on investing written for the lay-public and the stock market bible since its first appearance in 1949, it's a great resource, although it's quite a thick book and filled with detail- and probably not for anybody but the serious stock market investor. And if getting motivated to start investing is your problem, suggest The Sixty-Second Motivator. Good luck!



Two books: one old and good, one new and bad, 21 Sep 2006
This edition of The Intelligent Investor is really two books in one. There is the original 1973 edition of Ben Graham's classic on "value investing" and then a commentary on each chapter by Jason Zweig.
Graham's text is solid, a little heavy, sometimes a little out of date, and some of his tables a bit user-unfriendly; but no matter: it is the timeless lessons he teaches that matter. He is very methodical, a bit mathematical and -- if you follow him all the way -- will leave you with a good grounding in how to approach the stock market.
Basically his gospel is this: ignore all the hype and blather around the stockmarket. Invest for the long-term in big, rock-steady, simple businesses, after analysing them with a few financial criteria. But only buy when the market is offering them at a bargain price.
Unfortunately, each of Graham's sober tutorials is followed by a commentary by Zweig. He may claim to be a disciple of the great man, but he is certainly not cut from the same cloth. Zweig is just one more financial markets cheerleader: repetitive, pushy, and rolling out the same old disaster stories from the dot.com era ad nauseam, supposedly to show how wise Graham was (in case you didn't understand Graham's chapter). He also repeatedly cites his own magazine and keeps naming the same fund, which is annoying at the very least. He also resorts to a lot of "if you had bought shares on every third Wednesday since 1974 you would have made a 3,859 percent return!!" kind of hocus-pocus which is a complete waste of time.
Zweig could have used the opportunity to unpick some of the knottier points of Graham's book and help readers understand the harder parts. The worst thing is that he sometimes goes against Graham's teachings, so he should NOT be taken as an extension of Graham! (For example, on page 129 he says if you don't have time to choose your own stocks, there's no shame in hiring someone to pick them for you. On page 243, he says "In the financial markets, luck is more important than skill". Ben Graham must be turning in his grave.)
One more caveat: this volume boasts a preface and appendix by Warren Buffett, Ben Graham's most famous pupil. But don't be swayed by that. The preface is an obituary written by Buffett and the appendix is an edited talk that Buffett gave in 1984. They're okay but it doesn't mean that Buffett is backing this schizoid volume.
My advice: read the Graham chapters, ditch the Zweig commentary. You'll save time AND be wiser.

Definitive guide to value investing, 10 Sep 2006
This is probably the best place to start if you are interested in value investing. Although the latest revision by Graham was in the seventies, Jazon Zweig adds commentaries to each chapter to bring the information right up to date. The principles of investment are sound and the style of writing is very accessible. This is a classic investment book and should be read by most people planning for their financial future. Highly recommended.

Excellent Book, 18 Sep 2008
This book has full of practical trading tips and summarises the top ten mistakes made by traders. The book is written in plain English, so it's easy to understand and good fun to read too. I have found this book is very useful in my trading.


Without doubt..., 01 Sep 2008
.... the best book currently around for understanding the stock market. Robbie Burns is very good at explaining all the market jargon in a friendly and humourous tone, and there's masses of advice - particularly what not to do! The webiste is well worth a look too.

good book easy to read, 20 Jul 2008
good book easy to read, emphasises doing own research. Gives some usefull advice, such as avoiding shares with debt more than 3 times of Annual profit ( I would say rather Cash Flow)


Only regret is not buying it soon enough, 12 May 2008
I wish I bought it a year ago when I started trading... If I read this earlier, I could have avoided mistakes I made NT pointed out in the book.
The author's writing style is light and friendly so it's not a boring book to read. Clearly pointed out mistakes all newbie investors would make along with good habit of trading. It's not the investing bible nor get rich quick book but it definitely is investing 101 for newbies and intermediate investors.

Great., 05 Mar 2008
Although I have yet to find the time, spare cash or the confidence to start trading I do think that this book will prove invaluable to me when I finally do. The advice is not going to guarantee you a fortune over night or even guarantee you success. However it will make the whole world of stocks and shares much less of a mystery whilst providing you with some very useful hints tips and information. Looking over some of my friend's dealings and losses I now understand approximately where they may have gone wrong. Had they read this book first they may have saved themselves some money. Even such seemingly simple advice about setting loss stops and never buying into the `falling knife' stocks is very helpful. The author includes many examples of winning and losing scenarios as well as pointers on where deals often go wrong.
As other reviewers have said the book is very easy to read in a sitting or two, and also amusing in places.
I will be passing this on to my unsuccessful share dealing friends, and recommend it to anyone still in their early days of dealing.


How to get rich slowly, 20 Sep 2008
This is just about the best non fiction book I have ever read and most certainly the best £4 I ever spent.

There are many thousands of books out there which claim to make us millionaires over night, many of which are sold here on Amazon. But while they quite often have overall 5 star ratings, you never actually see any customer reviews informing us they did indeed become a millionaire over night. What The Richest Man In Babylon does though is instead tell us that through using common sense and a bit of self discipline, we can all become rich over time.

The synopsis is simple, through a series of very brief stories taken from recently excavated scrolls perportedly found in the ancient lost city of Babylon, you are told how to manage your money. Each little tale has one main message and pretty much all of them ring true today.

The startling thing about the success of this book for me was that there isn't actually anything new in it. The classic example of this is one of the early messages: 'Spend less than you earn and you will become rich.' Duh! Blatantly obvious really but if you think about it how many of us in this day and age actually do this? Where credit is so easy to obtain, how many of us now live beyond our means? I genuinely feel this should be given to kids and taught in schools as they are the ones who would most benefit from it.

One of the tales did stick in my throat a little bit and is slightly more difficult to apply in today's society: A chap in considerable debt who has decided to turn his life around is advised to go and see all his creditors to inform them that he is sorting it out and that they will get their money back gradually over a certain period, all the while still maintaining his 'spend less than he earns' mantra.

A good idea indeed but not very practicle in today's economy. Let's say an individual owes a large amount on their credit card and their minimum payments plus their other outgoings amount to more than they earn. (sound familiar?!) If he goes to his credit card company and says "look, sorry - I can't pay what you want each month but can give you £100 a month until it's cleared." The credit card company will probably agree to this in some form or another, after all £100 is better than nothing and this is pointed out in the book. But this kind of Individual Voluntary Arrangement today now becomes a social stigma and official black mark against our name, effectively stopping us from getting mortgages or any other type of ligitimate credit in the future.

The author of the 'scrolls' would say that this was not an issue as we should never use credit but today it is a necessary part of life and certainly about the only way most of us would be able to buy a house.

This minor quibble aside, I still wholeheartedly recommend this book to anyone who listens (and a few who don't, especially if they have kids too young to have made their parents' financial mistakes). Unlike one previous reviewer, I found the style very easy to read and even managed to get through entire chapters while waiting for my kettle to boil!

While there isn't really any true method to follow as such, I've applied the messages to my finances where possible for nearly 2 years now and have reduced my debt to a 10th of what it was and saved up a tidy few quid. I know it won't make me rich over night on it's own but I also know that I certainly won't be working for the rest of my life!

Get it, read it, follow what it says and you will become rich evetually.

Motivating a Wealth Mentality!, 25 Aug 2008
I read this book back in 1994. It has much timeless knowledge.

The Richest Man in Babylon is an inspirational book on helping to create an investment mentality by using parables of how the Richest Man in Babylon would have invested. It is for beginning investors who need good reasons to develop a proper mindset to start working towards becoming financially independent. It also is a good book for recharging a wealth mentality in any investor.

The concepts in the book are simple, but their effects on wealth are profound! For example, George Clason covers The Five Laws of Gold . From the version I read, they are:

I. Gold cometh gladly and in increasing quantities to any man who will put by not less than one-tenth of his earnings to create an estate for his future and that of his family.

II. Gold laboreth diligently and contentedly for the wise owner who finds for it profitable employment, multiplying even as the flocks in the field.

III. Gold clingeth to the protection of the cautious owner who invests it under the advice of men wise in its handling.

IV. Gold slippeth away from the man who invests it in businesses or purposes with which he is not familiar or which are not approved by those skilled in its keep.

V. Gold flees the man who would force it to impossible earnings or who followeth the alluring advice of tricksters and schemers or who trusts it to his own inexperience and romantic desires in investment.

Overall an excellent book for beginners though advanced investors.

The Re-Discovery of Common Sense: A Guide To: The Lost Art of Critical Thinking

Financial detox!, 19 Aug 2008
'The Richest Man in Babylon' is inspirational and has radically changed my outlook on my finances. It begins by using a parable about a poor man in Babylon who seeks the advice of a wealthy man to let him know the secrets of his seemingly never ending pot of gold. He discovers that these secrets are actually quite straightforward and easily put into practice, which he does with proven results. Pitfalls are overcome and all the while we are learning the core rules of accumulating wealth, maintaining wealth and, most importantly, multiplying wealth.

Although this book is set in Ancient Babylon the rules still apply today, although now we are talking about money in the bank as opposed to bars of gold or shekels in your purse! Overall this has given me a far more balanced view of my money and life in general. It almost feels like you are cleansing your soul as you read it - a sort of mind detox! So for anyone who dreads opening letters from the bank or buries their head in the sand, this book is for you!

Brilliant, 09 Aug 2008
This book is quite simply brilliant. I have bought copies for other people as presents and all of them really enjoyed it. Yes its message is simple, but simple ideas are nearly always the best. Do your self a favour and just buy it now.

Excellent, 25 Jul 2008
Very good book to help you examine your way of thinking to finance. Ideal for the beach when on holiday or a long plane flight as the book is difficult to put down, one of the few really good books on finance. The government should make this a part of the national curriculum in school to make future generations more responcible and sucessful with their own personal finances.

The writing on the wall, 14 Dec 2007
I am not an expert in finance; neither do I want to look into the details of LTCM's trading strategies. I was therefore still at a loss about what the LTCM's intricate financial schemes was all about even when I finished reading this book. Nevertheless, Lowenstein's work has impressed me very much since I read his another book 'Buffett: The Making of An American Capitalist' a few months ago. 'When Genius Failed' didn't disappoint me as well.

History repeats itself. Somewhat different as the backdrop and story of those events might have been, numerous financial debacles have taken place so far. Writers of financial history seem to find no shortage of materials on financial disasters. Sooner or later other similar books on the story of money games will appear in bookshops.


Utterly imprecise, 12 Nov 2007
Horrible book. Very interesting topic but very poor story telling. The author clearly knows next to nothing about statistics and finance and did very poor research; non experts in the field will struggle to understand the key concepts behind the trading strategies. True, some of those trades were extremely complex, but at least the basic concepts could and should have been explained more clearly. If I didn't work in finance myself I would have understood very little.
One passage is particularly worth commenting on, when the author mentions theoretical models whereby asset "prices follow the normal distribution, or, in mathematical terms, the log-normal distribution". ??? Unless we speak a different language, this phrase means that the log-normal is the mathematical definition of what is commonly known as the normal distribution. The truth is of course very different: if data is lognormal, then its log is normally distributed, i.e. they are 2 different distributions, related but different!!! A mistake so huge I don't even have words to comment.

Essential Reading, 21 Oct 2007
It would be a shame if this book were confined to readers of the 'Business' section. It should be required reading for anyone whose life is affected by the machinations of the financial sector - i.e. everyone.

In itself the tale is one of high drama, but it helps that it's told by a writer with the ability to keep up the pace and energy throughout, despite the complexities and opaqueness of a lot of the subject matter - and then distil the argument into one killer sentence: "Neither the Nobel prize nor all the degrees mattered now; the professors were rolling the dice." This single phrase encapsulates the essence of the story. Emboldened by their initial success and oblivious to any flaws in their 'system' they took on the mind-set of the gambler in the casino who 'knows' he can beat the house and throws caution to the wind. Thus a buttoned-up bunch of academics and highly rational financiers succumbed to the not-always-rational dictates of markets, convinced to the end (and beyond) that it was the world outside their number-crunching computer programs that had got it 'wrong'.

To the layman a further irony seems to be contained in the fact that a group who'd focussed so much on translating the disciplines of science into the world of finance seemed to have ignored the market equivalent of the observer effect - the possibility that their own theorems might in some way influence behaviour in the markets, effectively making their 'rear-view mirror' calculations based on past experience if not redundant then less reliable than expected. Maybe in trying to follow the Black-Scholes paradigm contemporary players were adjusting market reactions in a way that computer progams premised on projections from the past simply didn't accommodate? Perhaps, paradoxically for such a cards-to-the-chest operation, they had signalled their own reactions in advance (revealing your strategy in any circumstance isn't the way to win at poker!). Or perhaps they were just victims of their own success - in securing such a major stake in the game they actually changed the rules and then set themselves up as an easy target to be picked off by their rivals as soon as the odds went against them. In any case, their belief in their own omniscience seems like an invitation to failure.

There's an element of shadenfreude in seeing arrogance get its come-uppance, but this is tempered by a (sometimes grudging) admiration for the way Meriwether was able to change the world around him through sheer force of his (albeit reserved) personality and (almost) bring it off - particularly after the apparent injustice of his demise at Salomon. If he'd been able to impose his more cautious impulses on to his gung-ho acolytes, or trust the gut instincts that had served him so well at Salomon over Nobel prize-winning theorems, his success wouldn't have been so short-lived. Still, you needn't feel too sorry for the partners who lost $1.9bn in five weeks - they would fare better than some of their employees, who ended up with nothing.

It gives you the sort of entertainment you get from watching a car wreck, as the banks scrabble round to find a way of protecting themselves - without doing too much for each other. Certainly there's an element of black comedy as one participant comments: '"They had a different view of the world ... they're completely self-interested." Suddenly these paragons of individual enterprise seethed with communitarian fervor.'!

More worryingly, given that little seems to have changed as a result in terms of the kind of improved reporting on derivatives called for by Lowenstein, it looks like, in this age of 'collateralized debt' instruments, more such debacles are almost inevitable - it's just the scale of the collapse that remains in the balance. One thing is for sure, the regulators are pretty much in the dark as far as derivative trading goes, and it seems we're dependent on threats of Mutually Assured Destruction to keep us above water if liquidity crises aren't going to sink the whole ship (I'll leave you to ponder how a lack of liquidity can sink a ship).

What I'm trying to say is that this book is as relevant today - if not more so - than when published, and suggests that the sub-prime problems that have almost submerged Northern Rock may be just the tip of the iceberg (sorry, I just can't get the image of the Titanic out of my head!), and Adam Applegarth's defence of his business model does resound with the injured pride and lack of comprehension that characterised the protestations of the LTCM partners as they continued to defend their models in the face of mounting disaster.

Meanwhile, the balancing act that the regulatory authorities face, between discouraging moral hazard and safeguarding the system from wreckless gambling seems increasingly precarious - and will continue to be, so long as extreme neoliberal sentiments dominate. No doubt those that resist even self-regulation would argue the the LTCM saga provides an object lesson in how markets can repair themselves - but it was a close run thing.

Good, but could do better, 28 Jul 2007
Last week I finished reading the book `When Genius Fails: The Rise and Fall of Long Term Capital Management'. Although the book was generally interesting for those interested in banking and Wall Street if your looking for book that documents the incredible rise and embarassing fall of (apperently) extremely intelligent individuals then I would suggest that you go for the Enron story instead. The two books are extremely similar in content but the Enron story is more colourful and gives a much better insight into the greed and ambition of the main players.

Fascinating read, 12 Jul 2007
This is an informative and entertaining account of the rise and fall of LTCM - the biggest hedge-fund failure in history.

Roger Lowenstein does a great job of making what could have been a highly technical analysis of LTCMs trades and strategies into an book that is easily readable by anyone with a passing knowledge of business.

One of the best books I have read, 04 Oct 2008
This is one of the best books I have read, it makes you re-evaluate your life and see that it is for now - not later as later may never come. He does go a bit too much ionto what he thinks you should do with your free time but overall loads to gain from this this book. It is especially suited to those who have an online business like he does and most of the reference companies are American so that foe me was a downside as if there were UK reference companies for outside fullfillment etc that would make it more worthwhile however worth buying and defo gives a different perspective to life and what it can be.

There is one poem in there towards the end that I thought was so powerfull, I have typed up and put on me fridge !!

The 4-Hour Work Week, 16 Sep 2008
After reading the reviews and skimming the book in a local bookstore I bought this book.
To be honest it isn't a bad read and some tips (like leaving a message on your email, focusing on outcomes before you have a meeting and outsourcing where possible) were quite interesting but the main drawback seemed to me that it was really just a book for management and sale people not real producers and "wealth creators"
If you are a factory worker making cars, computers widgets etc you have to be there full time you can't outsource that work.
If you are a doctor you need to be there more than 4 hours a week
A teacher, nurse, shop worker, bus driver, airline pilot (the list goes on and on) can't expect to be paid a full salary for a 10% workload.
It just reinforces my prejudices that we really don't need managers at all!!
Remember the space ship in hitch hikers guide that was full of management gurus and telephone sanitizers-- Now they could do a 4 hour week!!

The Wealth Coach Loved The 4-Hour Work Week, 02 Sep 2008
I really liked several things about this book, not least that Tim Ferris didn't make it all sound easy, but rather, showed us why it is important to find a way to be financially free. Driven, successful people often find it hard to just lie on a beach, and how would you just take off on your own if you have always had people around you.....it sort of put me off a bit - which could have been sabotaging my long term success! I've always struggled with the idea of what to do when I no longer have to stay in the UK, when the kids are grown up, but can travel the world drawing a passive income from my business.....well, thanks to Tim, now I know what I'm going to do, I'm going to have "purposeful holidays". I'm going to go and live for 3-6 months at a time in an area I've always liked the sound of, rent apartements rather than live in hotels, and learn how to do things, speak languages, help people. How cool is that thought? I highly recommend this book which complements the other wealth creation biggies like "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" and "Think & Grow Rich", "One Minute Millionaire" etc. My only tiny niggle with the book was that Tim didn't go into too much detail about his path and challenges creating his own internet business and passive income, that would have been really interesting, but could form the basis for his next book perhaps?

A different view of work and life, 29 Aug 2008
I found this book great, not purely because of the actual content as a process to go through to reinvent your life, but more because it offeres such a different perspective and way of looking at life and people's priorities.

The process described is deceptively simple and challenging and there are some good points in there even if you don't make the whole jump. Plus there are some marevellous quotes along the way (I'm a sucker for quotations).

Reading this made me reevaluate how I prioritise work and life in general. I haven't gone the whole hog and joined the new rich (yet) but its already helped me with a more rounded view of the world and my part in it.

Creating the Life You Want to Live, 26 Aug 2008
This is an amazing book where I rediscovered the fact that life is short and not doing what you love is a waste of precious time. That being said not all jobs are rewarding or satisfying, but the energy and your self expression you bring to that job makes all the difference in the world. The ideas presented in this book are definitely not your traditional ones around the work place. Here Tim Ferris presents a whole new reality of what the work place can and has become for many people. One of discovering ways to work less hours, make more money and spent more time in activities outside of your workplace you like to do, ie traveling. You could say it's all about how you spend your time...quality vs quantity.

In reading Tim's book I was reminded of 2 brilliant authors named Ariel and Shya Kane who also present a non traditional approach to achieving and maintaining enlightenment without the previously conceived approach or need for years of working on yourself. Where you live life with a centeredness and ease no matter what life circumstances arise. The Kane's book titles include "Working on Yourself Doesnt Work: A Book about Instantaneous Transformation," "Being Here: Modern Day Tales of Enlightenment" and "How to Create a Magical Relationship." I highly recommend all these books. Life is way too short to not be living it as your heart desires.

A must read for the serious investor, 06 Aug 2008
The language may be a bit dated but the advice is still good, proving there is little new in the world of investing. If you follow Graham's practical advice on valuing companies, assessing risk and investing for the long term you will make money.

Lives up to the hype, 07 Jun 2007
Most investors seem to have heard of this book - many refer to it as the bible of value investing. I think that the esteem that it is held in is probably counter productive (Barton Biggs, hedge fund manager, talks about being asked to read and annotate it twice as a young man), but what impressed me is that it is a very simple readable book that explains how to invest long term, to maximise wealth.

I don't think that Zweig's commentary adds much - I would pay more for a version with it excised - it provides interesting detail on what Graham may have considered important which is great, but it also provides a lot of anecdotal evidence which could be misleading. It also triples the length and provides a lot of distraction.

Invest In This Book, Invest In Yourself, 24 Sep 2006
With more than one million copies sold and an endorsement on the cover by Warren Buffet, you know there has to be something to this book- and I think I know why. Simply because it is the first book ever to describe the emotional framework and analytical tools necessary for financial success for individual investors.

Probably the single best book on investing written for the lay-public and the stock market bible since its first appearance in 1949, it's a great resource, although it's quite a thick book and filled with detail- and probably not for anybody but the serious stock market investor. And if getting motivated to start investing is your problem, suggest The Sixty-Second Motivator. Good luck!



Two books: one old and good, one new and bad, 21 Sep 2006
This edition of The Intelligent Investor is really two books in one. There is the original 1973 edition of Ben Graham's classic on "value investing" and then a commentary on each chapter by Jason Zweig.
Graham's text is solid, a little heavy, sometimes a little out of date, and some of his tables a bit user-unfriendly; but no matter: it is the timeless lessons he teaches that matter. He is very methodical, a bit mathematical and -- if you follow him all the way -- will leave you with a good grounding in how to approach the stock market.
Basically his gospel is this: ignore all the hype and blather around the stockmarket. Invest for the long-term in big, rock-steady, simple businesses, after analysing them with a few financial criteria. But only buy when the market is offering them at a bargain price.
Unfortunately, each of Graham's sober tutorials is followed by a commentary by Zweig. He may claim to be a disciple of the great man, but he is certainly not cut from the same cloth. Zweig is just one more financial markets cheerleader: repetitive, pushy, and rolling out the same old disaster stories from the dot.com era ad nauseam, supposedly to show how wise Graham was (in case you didn't understand Graham's chapter). He also repeatedly cites his own magazine and keeps naming the same fund, which is annoying at the very least. He also resorts to a lot of "if you had bought shares on every third Wednesday since 1974 you would have made a 3,859 percent return!!" kind of hocus-pocus which is a complete waste of time.
Zweig could have used the opportunity to unpick some of the knottier points of Graham's book and help readers understand the harder parts. The worst thing is that he sometimes goes against Graham's teachings, so he should NOT be taken as an extension of Graham! (For example, on page 129 he says if you don't have time to choose your own stocks, there's no shame in hiring someone to pick them for you. On page 243, he says "In the financial markets, luck is more important than skill". Ben Graham must be turning in his grave.)
One more caveat: this volume boasts a preface and appendix by Warren Buffett, Ben Graham's most famous pupil. But don't be swayed by that. The preface is an obituary written by Buffett and the appendix is an edited talk that Buffett gave in 1984. They're okay but it doesn't mean that Buffett is backing this schizoid volume.
My advice: read the Graham chapters, ditch the Zweig commentary. You'll save time AND be wiser.

Definitive guide to value investing, 10 Sep 2006
This is probably the best place to start if you are interested in value investing. Although the latest revision by Graham was in the seventies, Jazon Zweig adds commentaries to each chapter to bring the information right up to date. The principles of investment are sound and the style of writing is very accessible. This is a classic investment book and should be read by most people planning for their financial future. Highly recommended.

Excellent Book, 18 Sep 2008
This book has full of practical trading tips and summarises the top ten mistakes made by traders. The book is written in plain English, so it's easy to understand and good fun to read too. I have found this book is very useful in my trading.


Without doubt..., 01 Sep 2008
.... the best book currently around for understanding the stock market. Robbie Burns is very good at explaining all the market jargon in a friendly and humourous tone, and there's masses of advice - particularly what not to do! The webiste is well worth a look too.

good book easy to read, 20 Jul 2008
good book easy to read, emphasises doing own research. Gives some usefull advice, such as avoiding shares with debt more than 3 times of Annual profit ( I would say rather Cash Flow)


Only regret is not buying it soon enough, 12 May 2008
I wish I bought it a year ago when I started trading... If I read this earlier, I could have avoided mistakes I made NT pointed out in the book.
The author's writing style is light and friendly so it's not a boring book to read. Clearly pointed out mistakes all newbie investors would make along with good habit of trading. It's not the investing bible nor get rich quick book but it definitely is investing 101 for newbies and intermediate investors.

Great., 05 Mar 2008
Although I have yet to find the time, spare cash or the confidence to start trading I do think that this book will prove invaluable to me when I finally do. The advice is not going to guarantee you a fortune over night or even guarantee you success. However it will make the whole world of stocks and shares much less of a mystery whilst providing you with some very useful hints tips and information. Looking over some of my friend's dealings and losses I now understand approximately where they may have gone wrong. Had they read this book first they may have saved themselves some money. Even such seemingly simple advice about setting loss stops and never buying into the `falling knife' stocks is very helpful. The author includes many examples of winning and losing scenarios as well as pointers on where deals often go wrong.
As other reviewers have said the book is very easy to read in a sitting or two, and also amusing in places.
I will be passing this on to my unsuccessful share dealing friends, and recommend it to anyone still in their early days of dealing.


How to get rich slowly, 20 Sep 2008
This is just about the best non fiction book I have ever read and most certainly the best £4 I ever spent.

There are many thousands of books out there which claim to make us millionaires over night, many of which are sold here on Amazon. But while they quite often have overall 5 star ratings, you never actually see any customer reviews informing us they did indeed become a millionaire over night. What The Richest Man In Babylon does though is instead tell us that through using common sense and a bit of self discipline, we can all become rich over time.

The synopsis is simple, through a series of very brief stories taken from recently excavated scrolls perportedly found in the ancient lost city of Babylon, you are told how to manage your money. Each little tale has one main message and pretty much all of them ring true today.

The startling thing about the success of this book for me was that there isn't actually anything new in it. The classic example of this is one of the early messages: 'Spend less than you earn and you will become rich.' Duh! Blatantly obvious really but if you think about it how many of us in this day and age actually do this? Where credit is so easy to obtain, how many of us now live beyond our means? I genuinely feel this should be given to kids and taught in schools as they are the ones who would most benefit from it.

One of the tales did stick in my throat a little bit and is slightly more difficult to apply in today's society: A chap in considerable debt who has decided to turn his life around is advised to go and see all his creditors to inform them that he is sorting it out and that they will get their money back gradually over a certain period, all the while still maintaining his 'spend less than he earns' mantra.

A good idea indeed but not very practicle in today's economy. Let's say an individual owes a large amount on their credit card and their minimum payments plus their other outgoings amount to more than they earn. (sound familiar?!) If he goes to his credit card company and says "look, sorry - I can't pay what you want each month but can give you £100 a month until it's cleared." The credit card company will probably agree to this in some form or another, after all £100 is better than nothing and this is pointed out in the book. But this kind of Individual Voluntary Arrangement today now becomes a social stigma and official black mark against our name, effectively stopping us from getting mortgages or any other type of ligitimate credit in the future.

The author of the 'scrolls' would say that this was not an issue as we should never use credit but today it is a necessary part of life and certainly about the only way most of us would be able to buy a house.

This minor quibble aside, I still wholeheartedly recommend this book to anyone who listens (and a few who don't, especially if they have kids too young to have made their parents' financial mistakes). Unlike one previous reviewer, I found the style very easy to read and even managed to get through entire chapters while waiting for my kettle to boil!

While there isn't really any true method to follow as such, I've applied the messages to my finances where possible for nearly 2 years now and have reduced my debt to a 10th of what it was and saved up a tidy few quid. I know it won't make me rich over night on it's own but I also know that I certainly won't be working for the rest of my life!

Get it, read it, follow what it says and you will become rich evetually.

Motivating a Wealth Mentality!, 25 Aug 2008
I read this book back in 1994. It has much timeless knowledge.

The Richest Man in Babylon is an inspirational book on helping to create an investment mentality by using parables of how the Richest Man in Babylon would have invested. It is for beginning investors who need good reasons to develop a proper mindset to start working towards becoming financially independent. It also is a good book for recharging a wealth mentality in any investor.

The concepts in the book are simple, but their effects on wealth are profound! For example, George Clason covers The Five Laws of Gold . From the version I read, they are:

I. Gold cometh gladly and in increasing quantities to any man who will put by not less than one-tenth of his earnings to create an estate for his future and that of his family.

II. Gold laboreth diligently and contentedly for the wise owner who finds for it profitable employment, multiplying even as the flocks in the field.

III. Gold clingeth to the protection of the cautious owner who invests it under the advice of men wise in its handling.

IV. Gold slippeth away from the man who invests it in businesses or purposes with which he is not familiar or which are not approved by those skilled in its keep.

V. Gold flees the man who would force it to impossible earnings or who followeth the alluring advice of tricksters and schemers or who trusts it to his own inexperience and romantic desires in investment.

Overall an excellent book for beginners though advanced investors.

The Re-Discovery of Common Sense: A Guide To: The Lost Art of Critical Thinking

Financial detox!, 19 Aug 2008
'The Richest Man in Babylon' is inspirational and has radically changed my outlook on my finances. It begins by using a parable about a poor man in Babylon who seeks the advice of a wealthy man to let him know the secrets of his seemingly never ending pot of gold. He discovers that these secrets are actually quite straightforward and easily put into practice, which he does with proven results. Pitfalls are overcome and all the while we are learning the core rules of accumulating wealth, maintaining wealth and, most importantly, multiplying wealth.

Although this book is set in Ancient Babylon the rules still apply today, although now we are talking about money in the bank as opposed to bars of gold or shekels in your purse! Overall this has given me a far more balanced view of my money and life in general. It almost feels like you are cleansing your soul as you read it