
Title : How to Retire Rich: Time-Tested Strategies to Beat the Market and Retire in Style
Author : James P. O'Shaughnessy
Rating : 5 Stars out of 5.
Summary : A Nobel Prize for O'Shaughnessy!
The main message of _How to Retire Rich_ is that if you want to retire rich, or retire at all for that matter (ever!), you must invest in the stock market. You just don't have a choice in the matter. Sit down and let James O'Shaughnessy take you through the math---you'll quickly see that that is just the financial reality. The good news, however, is that investing in the stock market, when done properly, is not what you think it is. It's not about outsmarting all the other investors out there. It's not about trying to get a 'ten-bagger' so you can buy a cool car and brag at parties. It's not even about shrewd business savvy and scanning financial reports. It's about picking an effective strategy and sticking with it year in, year out until the day you retire, never pulling your money out of the market.
But if that sounds hard, don't worry. One of HTRR's strongest points is the wealth of wisdom it provides on the mental aspects of investing over the long term. What do you do if your portfolio tanks? What do you do if it soars? This is a problem? You'd be surprised! O'Shaughnessy is probably the only author with a completely rounded, mature outlook on the emotional aspects of investing. Reading HTRR will give you the confidence you need to invest and stay in the market through good times and bad.
So how do you invest? O'Shaughnessy breaks it all down for you, telling you exactly what to do. We're not talking the usual vague, feelgood accepted wisdom here such as 'buy market leaders' or 'buy on weakness, sell on strength'. Throw all those books in the trash! HTRR will tell you how to quickly find the precise stocks you should buy. You'll finish the book at 2 o'clock and have a list of the stocks to buy in your hand at 2:30. Yes, it's just that easy. You'll also know exactly when to buy them (now) and when to sell them (a year from now), and what do after that (repeat the process until you retire). What could be simpler?
O'Shaughnessy should be nominated for a Nobel Prize. He is a modern-day Charles Darwin with a theory that has all the hallmarks of a revolution in scientific thought. The theory is simple, but deceptively so. Many readers come away thinking they have understood it, only to later demonstrate that they clearly haven't. Even Motley Fool was apparently unable to grasp Reasonable Runaways (one of the strategies in HTRR). They tried to test it with a universe of stocks picked from Value Line (!). When it wasn't performing well after six months (!), they wondered how they could tweak it (!) to "make it dance" (their words). You'll understand just how ridiculous all of this is when you read HTRR.
Perhaps the reason for this widespread misunderstanding is that while the theory itself is simple, its ramifications are not---and without understanding its ramifications, it is impossible to truly understand the theory. Like Darwin, O'Shaughnessy has taken 'God'---the human element---completely out of the picture. That's what readers find so hard to grasp. O'Shaughnessy has shown that not only is human intervention in portfolio management not necessary, it's downright harmful. Given enough time, any human intervention will only lower a portfolio's returns from the optimum returns that could be obtained using a simple model.
I hesitate to include the returns I have earned over the past four years using the Reasonable Runaways strategy in this review, because I don't think they're typical. I have earned 93.15% (CARR of 17.88%) versus 1.17% (CARR of 0.29%) for the SP during the same period (July 15, 2001 to July 15, 2005). And this is during a time period that includes 9/11. But as you'll discover from reading HTRR, four years is a meaninglessly short amount of time over which to gauge performance. Also, giving out exciting returns numbers shifts the discussion away from the real message of the book---get in the stock market and stay there (investing properly of course). It's the only way you'll ever be able to retire, rich or otherwise.
For UK readers, Ifd also like to point out that if you invest in the US stock market and live outside the UK (as I do), itfs tax-free. How can you go wrong?

Title : Winning the Money Game Made Easy: Building Assets and Wealth for Your Future
Author : Bradley L. Gummow
Rating : 5 Stars out of 5.
Summary : Comprehensive guide for building your own investment plan.
As I approached 30, I became a little worried about my future financial security. Not knowing much about the stock market, investing, IRAs and whatnot and being a do-it-yourself person, I went looking for a book that would help me in my financial planning. B.L. Gummow's book "Winning the Money Game Made Easy" jumped right out to me. I found this guide incredibly easy to read and use. Mr. Gummow, through a series of thoughtful relevant exercises, helped me evaluate my current financial situation and develop my own investment plan based on the things I want to achieve in my future. I had always felt that Wall Street symbols and jargon were very confusing. This book helped explain what things meant and empowered me to make my own decisions and not just regurgitated advice from co-workers and friends. I would highly recommend "Winning the Money Game Made Easy" to any self-starter who wants to make knowledgeable decisions about their future financial security.
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Title : Mrs. Ted Bliss
Author : Stanley Elkin
Rating : 3 Stars out of 5.
Summary : Beautiful language, ugly plot
Mr. Elkin has a wonderful style, with phrases that you reread and say out loud to yourself, that you remember when you put the book down. But that's about all you remember, because the plot and the characters leave much to be desired. I think Elkin put a little too much into forming the most perfect, most beautiful sentences, and not enough into the actual story. I never cared about what happened to Dorothy, or anyone else in her mundane existance. Literature is not literature if it doesn't move you, and Mrs. Ted Bliss most definetly failed in that regard.
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Title : The Golden Door to Retirement and Living in Costa Rica: A Guide to Inexpensive Living in a Peaceful Tropical Paradise
Author : Cristobal Howard
Rating : 1 Stars out of 5.
Summary : Great book--if you lack common sense
This book is great if are planning on traveling to Costa Rica as a tourist for a short amount of time; however, it really does not emcompass the complexity of moving or investing in a foreign country. Don't be fooled--this book lacks substinative information on starting a business in Costa Rica, other than the overarching message that "Not everything in the States will work in Costa Rica." Oh, really? My other favorite section was "How to Find a Nice Girl." After "interviewing hundreds of quality Costa Rican women" the author managed to whittle through the unrespectable, poor, uneducated women who were only after him for his money and find a nice girl. I guess the real shame is that he wasn't able to complete this process through a mail-order catalog.

Title : The New Golden Door to Retirement Living in Costa Rica
Author : Christopher Howard
Rating : 5 Stars out of 5.
Summary : "This Books is my Right Hand"
This book is my Right Hand, as manager of the Residents Association of Costa Rica (ARCR), I have found that newcomers sometimes seem to know more about Costa Rica than people living here just because they read this excellent book.