Most trading books are written by trading failures , why would you want to learn from failures who don't know how to make money from trading? http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=236978&perpage=6&pagenumber=1
Vic Sperandeo, "Trader Vic: Methods of Wall Street Master" is the great one and my trading is still mostly based on principles, studied from that book. He explained things there in a very clear and straightforward manner, no smoke and mirrors. At all. And he is the real trader by the way, which is a proven fact.
Hi Pro, I would say that when you start out in a subject you don't know much about, read a book or two about it. That goes for trading, or carpentry, or collecting baseball cards. Would you agree with this? Anyhow, I was commenting on that particular book, which I read and didn't want this poor guy to spend too much of his money (and time) on. I do understand, though, that different people will get different things out of different books, and I don't want to hamstring him with my opinion. He should evaluate things for himself, which is how traders come to form their trading styles. Would you agree with this as well?
One sure can get confused reading posts here on ET. Price action is technical analysis. To the OP: Don't read books! Read charts.
read stock rampers by golman sachs mentor rampers by Baron Baron holding the market higher with a string , by Baron Gufaw
As far as TA. There is no substitute for studying market structure and price action over the years. This is why there is no book out there than captivate the full experience required to move forward, at least I've never read it. You are better off learning from books about statistical studies, proper money management, helping you achieve proper mindset, and things of that nature. Some books get close and touch important subjects but when it's time to move to the second level, either the book ends or they infest the learning process with stuff that will derail you.
On that note ... "Evidence-Based Technical Analysis" by Aronson is a must read - at least if you want to understand how to make the difference between a valid system and the rest. But even before that ... you have to realize that trading is a negative-sum game - meaning after the close, every day, the only sure thing is that all market participants have collectively lost the amount of their commissions to the exchanges & brokers. What's left is slowly redistributed from the less experienced to the "pros" (which are mainly big trading firms, but also include a small fraction of retail traders). To be brutally blunt, your (mine, anyone, really) chances of ever making the transition from newbie to "pro" are next to nil. But you won't know for sure, unless you give it your best try ... please realize this will cost you a *lot* of money, time, efforts no matter the end result. And, really, do you think anyone right in his own mind would ever publish a trading system that actually works? See Aronson's book part B, he does a great educational job in this area. But, on the other hand, there are many useful concepts to be learned from others ... meaning reading, be it forums or books. Just don't expect free money.