A monthly post looking at what books Abnormal Returns readers purchased at Amazon in the prior month has become very popular with our readers. It serves as a great list for readers looking for interesting new investment-related books. We also had a big post on hedge fund-related books that will drive a lot of sales next month. Nearly 42% of purchases were of a single copy so I have omitted them. Below are the books (combined print and Kindle) that our readers purchased for October 2012:

The Bestsellers

1. The Signal and the Noise: Why So Many Predictions Fail-but Some Don’t by Nate Silver.
2. Abnormal Returns: Winning Strategies from the Frontlines of the Investment Blogosphere by Tadas Viskanta.
3. 48 and Counting: A Story of Money, Love and Bicycling by Jonathan Clements.
4. The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right by Atul Gawande.
5. The Success Equation: Untangling Skill and Luck in Business, Sports, and Investing by Michael J. Mauboussin.
6. The Missing Risk Premium: Why Low Volatility Investing Works by Eric Falkenstein.
7. The Wisdom of Psychopaths: What Saints, Spies, and Serial Killers Can Teach Us About Success by Kevin Dutton.
8. The Value Investors: Lessons from the World’s Top Fund Managers by Ronald Chan.
9. Hedge Fund Market Wizards by Jack Schwager.
10. What’s Behind the Numbers?: A Guide to Exposing Financial Chicanery and Avoiding Huge Losses in Your Portfolio by John Del Vecchio.

The Rest

1. Dark Pools: High-Speed Traders, A.I. Bandits, and the Threat to the Global Financial System by Scott Patterson.
2. How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiousity and the Hidden Power of Character by Paul Tough.
3. Makers: The New Industrial Revolution by Chris Anderson.
4. Practice Perfect: 42 Rules for Getting Better at Getting Better by Doug Lemov.
5. The Behavior Gap: Simple Ways to Stop Doing Dumb Things with Money by Carl Richards.
6. The New Tycoons: Inside the Trillion Dollar Private Equity Industry That Owns Everything by Jason Kelly.
7. Unconventional Success: A Fundamental Approach to Personal Investment by David Swensen.
8. Volcker: The Triumph of Persistence by William L. Silber.
9. Hedge Fund Analysis: An In-Depth Guide to Evaluating Return Potential and Assessing Risks by Frank J. Travers.
10. Misunderstanding Financial Crises:Why We Don’t See Them Coming by Gary Gorton.
11. The Half-life of Facts: Why Everything We Know Has an Expiration Date by Samuel Arbesman.
12. The Most Important Thing: Uncommon Sense for the Thoughtful Investor by Howard Marks.
13. The Revenge of Geography: What the Map Tells Us About Coming Conflicts and the Battle Against Fate by Robert D. Kaplan.
14. The Zeitgeist Investor: Unlocking The Mind of the Market by Tim Richards.
15. Think Twice: Harnessing the Power of Counterintuition by Michael J. Mauboussin.
16. Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman.
17. Wait: The Art and Science of Delay by Frank Partnoy.

Thanks again to everyone who purchased a copy of my book or any other book (or item) during the month. Did you find something interesting to read this month? If so, leave a comment to give every one a head’s up.