A shape-shifting black-panther, warring seraphs, a gigantic subterranean organism, a world where 99% of the population is lycanthropic and other oddities abound in our latest science fiction and fantasy picks. My fav is 'Eifelheim', a moving novel in which aliens land in a small German village just before the Black Death hits. Father Dietrich approaches the 'demons' like a natural philosopher, but sometimes he and his mediaeval townsfolk are the more alien to us.
The kitchen gardens at Heligan, how to have a perfect pet, Oswald Blumhard (a New Zealand plant pioneer), homes in harmony with nature, loveable tarnished and tatty furniture and organic gardens are among the topics of our house and garden recent picks.
Dazzle your dinner guests with coconut and kaffir lime pannacotta, a escabeche of freshwater trout with remoulade salad and Michael Cooper's pick of New Zealand wines. Cook a Chinese feast to impress the gods, or sneakily feed your guests a South Beach Diet meal (they claim to be delicious and healthy, but who knows). More in our cooking recent picks.
We have many new Chinese and Russian language books in our Community languages section. There are also 10 new romances in Tagalog and some books in Khmer.
Check out our newest New Zealand books for information on richly feathered cloaks, the entrepreneurial activity of Maori in the early colonial period, tramping tips, the making of Levin, pioneering women, the paintings of Harold Coop, NZ design and more.
Crochet for your pet, construct fun fabric flowers, create tessellating quilt designs, knit an itty bitty hat, give eco-friendly gifts, maximise your scrapbook stash, embroider wackily and wildly. Visit our new craft recent picks for more ideas.
Travel to the mythical America of modern crime fiction, spend sunrise with seamonsters, visit NZ's wondrous caves that glow, and read about the cringe-inducing antics of women on the road in our new travel books.
Flash 8, resumes, privacy, family websites, openoffice.org 2, LAMP, Photoshop CS2, Ajax, SQL server 2005 ... what more could you want than our new computer books. Well, I, for one, would like a pet tiger, but I'll settle for an Ubuntu book.
The subjects of our latest popular non-fiction eat twelve meals a day, fall in passionate love, attend seances delivered by tricksters, dream of Utopias, judge people by their cars, and enact destruction.
Victorian England is the subject of our latest history feature. From fops and dandies to thieves and urchins, it was a time of contrasts. We recommend some of our favourite books, including Henry Mayhew's remarkable work of oral history, 'The London underworld in the Victorian period: authentic first-person accounts by beggars, thieves, and prostitutes.'
Crusaders, Phoenicians, Borgias, Polish Jews, Einstein and Katherine Howard are among the subjects of our latest history picks.
For our latest In the news feature, Divorce and Children, we have selected some of the most useful books, journal articles and webpages.
From the lightning-struck face of David Bowie to Marlene Dietrich in Dior; from Disney's 'Ladies-in-Hating' to a lawless gunslinger spreading mayhem. Our buyers have diverse tastes - check out their latest picks.
Looking for a copy of 'Sheep may safely graze' by Bach to walk down the aisle to? Concerned that your lack of interest in the bridesmaids' shoes might offend them?
An escaped pride of lions in Baghdad, kid geniuses, a dutiful Samurai and a frontier town full of vampires are among the joys awaiting you in our newest graphic novels.
Stargazers, flowery eventides and prisoners. Our latest radio show on Access 783AM explores folk music, both new and trendy and not-so. For more information, check out the radio show track-list on our popular music page.
Surfing, tag-rugby, horsemanship, volleyball and bridge are among the topics of our latest sport and fitness recent picks.
We now have a gardening pathfinder to help you locate our gardening, landscaping and botanical resources. As well as the books and magazines in the library, you can access the full-text of several gardening magazines and the wonderful 'Oxford Companion to the Garden' via our online databases.
Dyslexia, menopause, heart disease, breast cancer, children with eating disorders and vaccination are among the topics of our latest health picks.
Ubuntu, Photoshop Elements 4 and CS2, Maya 7, Java programming, Dreamweaver 8, C# and Openoffice.org are among the subjects covered in our computer recent picks. There's another Firefox book with a cute animal on the cover; there aren't enough cute tigers on Mac OS books.
We have new large print and audio-visual recommendations on our Seniors page. Learn about Len Lye and Michael King from DVDs; read about actress Prunella Scales, Monty Don (the face of British gardening), BBC radio and life on a Cotswold hill farm during WWII.
Our booklists for January are available - see what new general fiction, genre fiction, large print and DVDs we've bought.
Our new New Zealand books look at memorable moments in NZ sport, Keulemans' bird paintings, extinct native birds, the history of sheep in NZ and near-naked bungy jumpers.
This month our buyers recommend books on Lance Armstrong, famous days that changed the world, holiday destinations for children, ballroom dancing, movies of the 1930s, murderball, barbecuing for blokes ("impress your mates") and more.
The corporate corruption of universities, the top ten rock n' roll automobile accidents, a serial killer, the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi and Black Power are among the subjects covered in our latest popular non-fiction recent picks.
Write successful business proposals, do business in China, learn to speak like a CEO, ask smart questions during job interviews and determine whether your boss was raised by wolves - all this and more in our latest management recent picks.
