Just in time for the holiday shopping season, Stockerblog has released its list of 100 investment books -- the site adds that these are just the last 100 books the site has mentioned in the past couple of years, but if they're good enough to discuss, that's probably an endorsement of some kind. The list contains some classics and a lot of books you've probably never heard of.

Rather than rehash all the classics that every investor worth his or her salt has read, I'm going to give a list of a few of my favorite investment books that are either new but not bestsellers or long and forgotten. Click on the title for my review:

R. Foster Winans' Trading Secrets: This is a richly-written morality tale of sorts about the insider trading scandal that ruined Winans' career.

Either publishers are out of touch with the market, or the market doesn't know what a good business book is. I suspect it's the latter but, either way, I've been coming across a lot of really amazing, but tragically out-of-print books lately. This is in addition to the myriad terrible bestsellers -- chief among them Donald Trump/Robert Kiyosaki's Why We Want You to Be Rich. And I won't tempt you with a link to the Amazon page.

Anyway, the latest, greatest out-of-print business book I've come across is The Funny Money Game, written by a very young Andrew Tobias, who later became famous for The Only Investment Guide You'll Ever Need. The Funny Money Game tells the story of Tobias's time as a an executive at National Student Marketing, a high-flying momentum stock during the 1960s. The company crashed quickly, mired in overly-aggressive expansion, mindless acquisitions, and fraudulent accounting. Tobias's options were left worthless. Seems an option to buy a $6 stock for $38 is of little value.

But what emerges from the damage is a delightful story of a chaotic corporation, more stock promotion than business venture. There is even a reference to options-backdating at the company -- a scandal that would grab headlines about 35 years after the publication of Tobias's first book. The company's efforts to portray itself as a cutting-edge, youth-oriented company when its profits, such as they were, came from old-line businesses like insurance are reminiscent of a more famous financial fiasco: Enron. We also learn about the most dangerous word in the history of mergers and acquisitions: synergy.

If you've read Tobias's work before, you know what to expect: The writing is breezy and often funny, and definitely the most enjoyable, light-hearted book ever written about a corporate train-wreck. And while it's out of print, you can get a copy used on Amazon for 41 cents.