What are the top 5 books a novice should read before embarking on buying stocks and shares?
Any ideas?

I accept your point Overgrowth. My criticism of Staceys books was maybe a little over the top but they do nothing for me. As for Buffettology i really meant it was a good way to understand investment in general and not just investing like Warren Buffett. The book contains various formulas to assess a company by looking at the fundamentals such as how much money has that company held on to from the EPS over the last 5 years (i.e. that which it hasnt paid out in dividends) and by using the amount it has held on to how successfully has it grown EPS in those 5 years. Allows you to compare similar companies etc. As you say its horses for courses but Staceys books are a little basic for me. Its like saying "I walked into Monsoon and saw it was queued out the door every saturday afternoon so i bought shares in it and low and behold they went up." I dont need Staceys book to tell me things like that and that is the kind of things he covers.

If you look at my list at the top it includes this book , i admit it's very basic, however , the thread did say for a complete novice, the books i read afterwards i chose as they got a little more in depth .

Candlesticks

Candlesticks

If you are a novice and assuming you have only a limited pot to begin with and no previous experience of loosing money in the market. I would suggest the following.


To give a good overlook of the market and how the different individuals and bodies function I would suggest these readable books. Either one or both :-

How to read the Financial Pages
By Michael Brett

Beginners Guide to Investment
By Bernard Gray

I wish I had read these earlier and from experience I should read again and again especially when making money to keep my feet on the ground and when I am loosing to remind me it is possible to make money and limit my losses.
It also warns you about ramping, scams, frauds, greed and has very useful Web page refs. Etc.

How to Win in a Volatile Market
By Alexander Davidson



Another Book already mentioned which might have help me early on and still helped me to reflect

Selecting Shares That Perform:
Ten Ways to Beat the Index (Investor's Guide) (Paperback)
By Richard Koch


Profit from you PC
By David Linton (Founder of Updata Software)

The first book gives you ideas how to set up your own system

If you are a novice and can use a PC this may give you some useful ideas for a small pot, but if you are making money invest in a software package to manage your portfolio and download end of day prices and has charting an and Fundamental Data.

Personal choice for me is Sharescope. But others use different packages. And you can get the coverage of Fundamental and Charting on line and also manage your portfolio. From Comdirect, Barclays, Smile, Etc. but they are a bit clumsy and you have to be on line/

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The last two are to add to your charting abilities looking for the X spot where the gold is buried.

I like both of them (Both mentioned before) although they are American. For me a very sensible approach, readable and not hyped. But use the charts for when to buy and sell, but look at the basic fundamentals before you BUY. Personal opinion. You wont get burnt so often.

The Pring book had a CD to go with the book and is very good. (IMO)

Technical Analysis for Dummies
By Barbara Rockefeller 1

Introduction too Technical Analysis (With CD)
Martin Pring


Good Lick, sorry luck. It can be fun, but don't use money which you may need for more important things.

Kazaa has some interesting manuals on shares.

ariesr,

can you post a link please?

British Bulls

"Profit from you PC
By David Linton (Founder of Updata Software) "

This book changed my life.

Before reading it I thought the way to success was by (a) reading the right journals and (b) having a well informed stock broker.

Reading David's book will show why neither of these are reliable and why the TA route can be (notice I don't say it always automatically is).

Then with a copy of Douglas Trading in the Zone to give you the confidence - not to teach you TA - you'll be well on the way.

For a good book on TA I'd recommend Jeremy du Plessis and his book on Point and Figure due out later this month.

TP

re Trader's Bible, the stakes & holdings spreadsheet has just been released:

http://www.harriman-house.com/tradersbible/downloads.htm