I recently finished "A Random Walk Down Wall Street", by Burton Gordon Malkiel. it's an excellent book! Starts off with the history of speculation, then explains how traders try to beat the market, and how they've historically succeeded/failed and why, all written from a very non-biased and scientific perspective. The book ends with a guide for investors of any age, and goes into asset allocation and risk management.
(Spoiler: buy and hold Index Funds is your best bet 100% of the time over a long enough timeline, unless you can make investing your full time job, then Index Funds are still your best bet, but only 99% of the time. Why? Because someone out there will beat the market, but it's essentially impossible to guess who, and the probability that it's you is low.)
