smorgasbord

Moving to Finland hasn't stopped my book addiction although it has slowed the flow a bit since I'm more selective about what I'm willing to pay to have shipped here. Stockmann has a decent selection, if a bit slim, of books from the UK so this helps keep me from shopping amazon.com with abandon. :) I have found a bunch of new books, CDs and DVDs worthy of shipping in the past few months:

• For those who enjoyed Salt: A World History will no doubt enjoy Bittersweet: The Story of Sugar. This book led me to consider writing a history of ginger since I adore eating ginger in most forms and it would appear to be one of the few spices or condiments which hasn't had a history of it published recently.
• Simon Winchester has a new book, Krakatoa: The Day the World Exploded: August 27, 1883 which should be quite a good read. I've been fascinated by Krakatoa ever since I read The Twenty-One Balloons when I was a kid.
• The Penguin Atlas of Food: Who Eats What, Where and Why so you can plan your holidays around the local cuisine.
• From Airline Reservations to Sonic the Hedgehog: A History of the Software Industry (History of Computing) from MIT Press in their continuing fine series on the History of Computing.
• Colour: Travels through the Paintbox, a history of pigments via an engaging travelogue.
• Practical Cryptography by Niels Ferguson and Bruce Schneier which should guarantee it being a useful book for most cryptoheads.
• A Consumers' Republic: The Politics of Mass Consumption in Postwar America which looks to be a fascinating study of American consumer economics.
• Dictionary of Americanisms: A Glossary of Words and Phrases, Usually Regarded as Peculiar to the United States which is an update to a classic reference.
• The Oxford Dictionary of Word Histories
• Fantabulosa: Dictionary of Polari and Gay Slang which should prove to be a source of great fun and curiosity.
• Latin: or the Empire of a Sign covers the history of Latin over a time period not often studied in great detail even when you take 8 years of it in Catholic school :)
• Language in Danger: How Language Loss Threatens Our Future, a rather important topic in modern linguistics.
• Alternative Histories of English that tries to give a lot more depth and realism to how and why English evolved into such a diverse language.
• Pattern Recognition is Gibson's best book in at least a decade. Definitely worth a read while I'm anxiously awaiting Quicksilver
• Schott's Original Miscellany for random entertaining trivia.
• Snow, Forest, Silence: The Finnish Tradition of Semiotics (Acta Semiotica Fennica) and Teach Yourself Finnish to help my continuing quest to understand this wacky language. :)
• Lonely Planet: Finland because I am still as fresh as a tourist around Finland.
• I can't say enough good things about the Cook's Illustrated series even though I now live in the land of metric measurements I still love their recipes and insights to cooking. The Quick Recipe (The Best Recipe Series) and Best Kitchen Quick Tips: 523 Tricks, Techniques and Shortcuts for the Curious Cook should both be as excellent as the various other CI books I have.
• Different is Jori Hulkkonen's new album and anyone who likes electronica and/or bossa nova should really give this one a try. (yes, he's Finnish :)
• Like the Deserts Miss the Rain is for ETBG fans and is worth the price of the cd for the version of Corcovado which was only on the Red, Hot and Rio album 5 or so years ago.
• I still have a very soft spot for the Pet Shop Boys; Disco Vol.3 will be sure to transport me back to the early 80s when I could dance until 4am without the rapidly aging body I have now :)
• Biography. Lisa Stansfield is such a fabulous singer and yet, much like Alison Moyet, far too often overlooked. She's the new Barry White only whiter and female. I love this woman.
• The Office - The complete series 1 is absolutely brilliant. If you loved the movie "Office Space" or "Haiku Tunnel" you'll quickly be demanding recordings of the Office from relatives and friends in the UK.