The Snowball

After turning away many biographers, journalists and publishers, Warren Buffett asked Alice Schroeder, for six years the only Wall Street analyst he would talk to, to write his life story. She left Morgan Stanley in 2003 and moved to Omaha to work on it full time. The research took more than 2,000 hours of reading his personal files and interviewing Buffett along with his family, friends and business associates. Buffett promised not to request revisions and told her to choose the less flattering version wherever accounts differed. The result goes past his investing style to his wider philosophy, his paradoxes and the life behind Berkshire Hathaway.

Richard Lambert, director-general of the Confederation of British Industry, said the biography offers clues to how Buffett stayed ahead of the market for most of 50 years. Trail Running Academy founder Robert Hajnal named it in an interview about his favourite books.