Order Book Distribution
what gives order books the V shape


I’m not sure what other shape could it be? (other than flat- no orders)? The order book represents all of the bids/asks of buyers/sellers in the market. Generally, it’s displayed in the ‘V-shape’ you mentioned, where the Y-axis of the chart displays the total cost to fill all orders between the market price, and the corresponding x-coordinate on the chart. So as you move further from the market price, there will be more orders to fill to reach that new price. 


  Is it mostly as simple as that?


Yeap, it’s just the orders that traders have submitted to the order book, easy as that.