A short and sweet book on not being horribly broke for the rest of your life, with very nice real life common sense advice. Most of her advice was the usual "pay off credit cards and save for retirement" stuff, but Orman did have some interesting ideas of financing education with credit instead of student loans and other rather radical idea. A good comfort book if you are feeling poor and the future is not looking so bright that you need to wear sunglasses.

Of course, I couldn't resist finding out more about cabinets of curiosities (the precursor to the modern museum). This gorgeous, weird book is a history of the cabinets and their weird contents - everything from sculpture, to shells and minerals, fake dragons and preserved baby heads.

Thud! Terry Pratchett

Life would be a much bleaker place without Terry Pratchett. Thud! Has all the usual happy Pratchettism, Vimes et al., lots of silly jokes and now a tie-in to his children's book "Where's my Cow?". The final reading of the book - "IS THIS MY COW? NO!", in the mines had me giggling like a nutter for an hour afterward. A good laugh. If you've never read Pratchett, what the hell is the matter with you?

I loved the original book by Aoki, Fruits - a collection of photos of Japanese street fashion. Fresh Fruits is the same format, kids in their truly outlandish fashions with a small chunk of commentary at the bottom. At first, I skipped over the rather hard to read comments on the bottom. However, the images soon became secondary when I really started paying attention. The first few lines of commentary are about where the kids got their clothes. However, the last line about "your current obsession" can be shocking, from the pierced punker who is obsessed with cooking rice balls to the delicate little Goth Lolita in floppy bonnet who is obsessed with cutting herself. Incredible pictures and a few, very succinct and interesting words.

Budget Living Magazine

I hate the title, but love the magazine to bits. Great, cheap stuff. What more could you want? Ways to get free stuff, find great clothes and furniture super cheap, how to fix things, throw affordable parties, travel on a few bucks and other ways to live fabulously on very little. http://www.budgetlivingmedia.com

Both books are written by self-described Urban Explorers. Both are collections of adventurous (and mostly illegal) visits the authors made into various urban areas, the New York underground, old, sealed aqueducts, climbing a crumbling hospital that once housed Typhoid Mary, and other hard-to-reach and long forgotten places. Not satisfied to just explore, both authors break and enter with aplomb. Solis gets drunk before embarking on her trip down the sewers in a rubber dingy, the Jinx crew insist on a full suit and tie plus shades for their intrepid adventurers (pumps and a dress for women). Read more and view images of various trips at: http://www.jinxmagazine.com/, http://www.infiltration.org/, http://www.newyorkunderground.org