The Motley Fool Investment Guide
The most accessible, irreverent introduction to stock market investing ever published. Teaches you to open a brokerage account, evaluate a company, and build a portfolio in plain English with humor. It democratized investing for a generation by proving that Wall Street's complexity is partly a moat to keep regular people out. The jester's cap turned out to be smarter than the pinstripe suit.
History embarrassed chunks of this one. Its flagship 'Foolish Four' strategy was data-mining dressed up as discipline, quietly retired by the Gardners themselves a few years on, and the message-board stock culture the book celebrates fed straight into the dot-com bonfire. The jokes hold up better than the system. Read it for the attitude; get the method elsewhere.
The case for it and the rest of the canon open with Pro.
