The Maven's Literary Canon of 2007

The Age of Turbulence: Adventures in a New World

Alan Greenspan might be wearing out his welcome with all his proclamations for pay since leaving office, and his obvious (and sad) missing of the limelight. But the man was a giant force in the economy for two decades. Enough said. Plus, The Age of Turbulence: Adventures in a New World (The Penguin Press) is surprisingly well written -- surprising considering his famously droning speaking style.

Microtrends: The Small Forces Behind Tomorrow's Big Changes

Here's the single factor that separates most good investors from the bad: the good take advantage of real trends, while the bad follow too many false ones. The business media complicate this by constantly running stories about trends, thanks to a few anecdotes and a catchy hypothesis. Mark Penn is a lot of things. He is the Clinton adviser who recently ran into a heap of trouble when he trumpeted Barack Obama's youthful cocaine use ... and kept trumpeting it as he was apologizing for it.

Penn is also a pollster who purportedly identified the soccer mom phenomena. This year he also came out with a book called Microtrends: The Small Forces Behind Tomorrow's Big Changes. While many of the trends seems no more based in fact than the ones you see in your average newspaper, the book serves as a rare clearinghouse for trend ideas that can serve as a good starting point for investors.

The Wolf of Wall Street

And no year is complete without a look at Wall Street's underbelly. Few applied more dirt to Wall Street's underbelly than Jordan Belfort, known as a low man in a high place. He was the "Wolf of Wall Street," master of the bucket shop. His book is The Wolf of Wall Street: Stock Market Multimillionaire at 26, Federal Convict at 36, I Partied Like a Rock Star, Lived like a King, and Barely Survived My Rise and Fall as an American Entrepreneurial Icon (Bantam), and though I would not believe a word of it, I also would not risk missing it. Belfort is nothing if not a good storyteller and the dark side of Wall Street is an essential part of any year's literary canon.

At the time of publication, Fuchs had no positions in any of the stocks mentioned in this column.

Marek Fuchs was a stockbroker for Shearson Lehman Brothers and a money manager before becoming a journalist who wrote The New York Times' "County Lines" column for six years. He also did back-up beat coverage of The New York Knicks for the paper's Sports section for two seasons and covered other professional and collegiate sports. He has contributed frequently to many of the Times' other sections, including National, Metro, Escapes, Style, Real Estate, Arts & Leisure, Travel, Money & Business, Circuits and the Op-Ed Page. For his "Business Press Maven? column on how business and finance are covered by the media, Fuchs was named best business journalist critic in the nation by the Talking Biz website at The University of North Carolina School of Journalism and Mass Communication. Fuchs is a frequent speaker on the business media, in venues ranging from National Public Radio to the annual conference of the Society of American Business Editors and Writers. Fuchs appreciates your feedback; click here to send him an email.

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