Overconfidence is not limited to investors, it also affects bloggers as well.  Every time I hit the Publish button on WordPress I think I’ve written something worth reading, otherwise I wouldn’t have hit Publish. The funny thing is that the blogosphere, i.e the market, has its own opinion. Some of what I thought were my best posts generated little or no reaction. Some posts that I thought were simply clever observations, or short takes on topics, garnered a ton of hits. The point is that I have very little insight into what is going to work when push comes to shove.

Thi problem is exacerbated when you go to write a book. Instead of getting feedback on a daily basis, you essentially bundle up months, and for some years, of work and unleash it on the public all at once. It is therefore gratifying when some one you respect actually likes your work. Josh Brown at the Reformed Broker is an accomplished blogger and maybe more importantly a bestselling author himself, e.g. Backstage Wall Street, so he recognizes the work that goes into writing a book. Josh recently wrote an (overly) kind review of my book. Here is a taste:

This is the antithesis of all the textbook-y tomes that have come and gone over the decades, Abnormal Returns allows you to skip most of them and simply consume the essence of the ideas themselves.  This is a book that I believe can help you improve as you begin to read it.

Fortunately Josh isn’t alone in his sentiments, Tim Richards at The Psy-Fi Blog also weighed in on the book. He looked at the nature of the investment blogosphere itself and how Abnormal Returns the blog and book fit in. Richards writes:

Avoiding the crap, and distilling what’s left, is what Abnormal Returns does.  Experienced investors will think they know of much of this, but they probably don’t.  Inexperienced investors won’t know this, and don’t know that they need to.  This is a view of the world of investment for the twenty first century; it’s both sophisticated and straightforward – sophisticated because investment markets are confusing places, and straightforward because the ultimate lessons aren’t that difficult as long as you can keep them straight in your head.

Investing is in very real way a real crap shoot. You can do all the work and still end up with less then favorable outcomes. In the end the results are out of your hands. The same could be said of blogging and book writing. I have already hit Publish on the Abnormal Returns book. Here’s hoping you enjoy the book half as much as these guys did.