Bookshelf speaks volumes

There are two kind of chaos. There's the creative kind found in an artist's studio. Then there's the mess you find on a desk like mine here at the paper.
Fired up with a neatness bug acquired raking leaves last weekend, I came to the office Monday morning in jeans and steel-toed boots, wheeled a Dumpster beside my desk and dug in.
The result, beyond a pristine cubicle that I've vowed to keep this way always, was a kind of archeological dig through hundreds of books sent over the years by hopeful publicists seeking reviews.
How life has changed!
Down in the deeper strata, from the mid- to late-'90s, were books from an age of innocence, a period of unbridled optimism about all the good things that soaring stock prices would bring.
Most of what I unearthed here is a mere historic curiosity, of no use today. Who needs a half-dozen books on retiring early? The market collapse of the past three years made the topic irrelevant to most of us.
And all those books on how to day-trade Internet stocks? Into the Dumpster!
The more recent books were gloomier, full of titles about how to survive a bear market, how to file for personal bankruptcy and how to repair your credit. I kept these -- the topics are sure to be hot over the next few years, now that we're experiencing record numbers of bankruptcies and foreclosures.
Clearly, we're in a dark era of cynicism, doubt and finger-pointing.
So much for the past. Today, my desk is clear. My bookshelves are stripped to only a few dozen volumes. Out of all the wisdom and foolishness of the financial ages, what was worth keeping?
The hot topics
Other than a book or two written by friends and kept out of loyalty, what remains is a gauge of what else I think will matter over the next few years.
There are, of course, about a dozen books on taxes. Barring something radical, such as a change to the flat tax or sales tax, the tax system is sure to be a permanent-employment program for personal finance columnists.
For reasons I can't fully explain, I've kept a couple of books called "Getting Started in Futures" and "Getting Started in Options." I don't think ordinary folk should play with these high-risk strategies, but the subject is titillating.
I kept the more recent books on how to save for college and how to go after financial aid. Paying for college is always going to be a big topic for me, especially now that the state colleges and universities -- the "cheap" alternatives -- are raising tuition at double-digit rates.
I also kept several books on how to invest in 401(k)s and IRAs. Paying for college and retirement -- that's what most people are worried about.
Bonds and funds
I also held on to a bunch of books on bonds and bond mutual funds. Investors who'd kept an adequate portion of their holdings in bonds have been pretty happy about it this year -- bonds surged while stocks cratered.
Then there are a couple of books on U.S. Savings Bonds. Lots of people love these things, and I've come to think they are a pretty good deal.
A wonderful book titled "Against the Gods -- the Remarkable Story of Risk," also has survived my purge. Starting with the first gamblers who learned to calculate odds, it traces the ever more sophisticated mathematics of balancing risk and reward.
The famous '90s book "Stocks for the Long Run" by Wharton professor Jeremy Siegel still has a place on my shelf. I do think stocks still are the best investment for 10- and 20-year periods, perhaps even for five-year periods.
But I'm hedging. I've also kept the book "Irrational Exuberance" by Siegel's friend, Yale professor Robert Shiller. He says we're in for a long market downturn because stocks are still overpriced.
Boy, I hope he's wrong.
XJeff Brown is a business columnist for The Philadelphia Inquirer. E-mail him at jeff.brown@phillynews.com.