Book excerpt: In 2001, after an investment adviser lost $300,000 of Ian MacDonald`s money, he took what was left and self-managed it. His investment objective was to build a stock scoring program that would give him an annual dividend income worth 6% of his portfolio, while increasing the value of that portfolio every year by about 9% (his background was in building commercial risk scoring computer programs for the banks and other businesses). He succeeded in his objective. While he had developed that stock scoring program for his own use, in 2019 he used it to help an elderly lady who had suffered a catastrophic financial loss, due to am investment adviser`s greed. After much of her loss had been recovered and her monthly income had doubled, she told Ian MacDonald that he needed to write a book to help people like her who knew little about investing and could easily be taken advantage of . He wrote that book. It is called, "Income and Wealth from Self-Directed Investing".He includes that PC stock scoring program with his 300 page book. To further help investors, in the last 100 pages of the book, are charts listing all the companies traded on the TSX that pay a dividend of 3.5% or more. Four sorts of the data in these charts is provided: by score, stock price, dividend percent and by company name. The data sorts make it easy and fast to identify and weigh which stocks are the best ones to add to your portfolio. Like the elderly widow, there are many who fear that they will outlive their life savings? They feel forced to use investment advisers because no one has shown them how to invest safely. Ian MacDonald`s book takes away the fear of investing by explaining, the following in easy to understand language: (1) The danger of entrusting your money to an investment adviser whose fees and hidden agenda could drain your savings.(2) Why investing in dividend paying common stock is the safest way for you to invest, as compared to bonds, mutual funds, etc. (3) How to open an online self-directed stock trading account without having to involve bank employees.(4) How to easily find for your portfolio the best twenty stocks for capital gain and the highest dividends.(5) How to find and sort potential stock purchases from best to worse, so you can pick the twenty best and safest.(6) How to verify that stocks have no harmful information attached to them that could potentially be a problem if purchased.(7) How to purchase a stock you have carefully chosen, in less than five minutes.(8) How to quickly and easily monitor your purchased stocks on a daily, monthly and quarterly basis.The stock market is not a casino and what Ian MacDonald teaches is not a get rich quick scheme. It is a logical, easy to understand method of investing. Since implementing his scoring system, his portfolio has grown by 300% while generating a steady ever growing retirement income. He thinks every investor should now know exactly what they are invested in and understand why they are invested in it. Through booming times and recessions there is no reason your self-directed portfolio can not generate a reliable monthly income and grow year-after-year.