Just my opinion, but I think trying the tape reading ship has long sailed. I began with that for equities and watch it slowly erode over time. It was a good education in edge decay. You can get close to the principles behind it by reading Steidlmayer and using a volume profile tool.
I was actually planning to add that, but since tape reading honestly is something I don`t know that much about I was thinking that perhaps I should shut my mouth and just answer the god damn question for once I`m sure that not all markets are dominated by algos, but in those that are, with "fake" bids and offers entered and pulled constantly, I`m not sure if any sane human being is able to gather anything useful from it. Transacted bid/ask volume analysis may be valuable though.
Yeah, plus a lot of the edge was associated with identifying certain specialist habits in listed stocks. There were several tells in how the inside was quoted that allowed you to ride along with him as he fills a big order, culminating in an exhaustion gap or what not. Even without the algos, the specialist is gone. A trader has limited time to invest in learning price behavior, and with all the noise on the DoM it's better to start simply I think. Save the extreme confusion and exhaustion. Volume profile shows similar information in visual form, if that's your flavor.
I pulled off my book shelves 5 tape reading books I have studied in the past. Tape reading was the method of reading the financial markets in the early 1900s (with the ticker tape) and was being used by many traders including me when I started trading in 1972 (in the form of tape board displays on the trading floors of brokerage houses). We still use the modern form of tape reading in the form of real time charts and watch list. I consider "Markets in Profile" and "Mind over Markets" to be the best two books that use a method of chart reading that sort of parallels tape reading of the ticker tape and ticker boards of the long past. The below list of 5 Tape Reading books from my book shelves starts with the best and ends with the worst based on the amount of highlighting I did in the books when I studied them. Studies in Tape Reading Truth of the Stock Tape Ticker Technique: The Art of Tape Reading Tape Reading for the 21st Century Tape Reading & Market Tactics My recommendation is do not waste your time with the 5 books I listed for tape reading and buy and study "Markets in Profile" and "Mind over Markets". Both books are studies of market profile by James E. Dalton. The best book "Markets in Profile" assumes you have already studied "Mind over Markets". My 2 cents Catoosa