What are your favorite retouching/photo books for 2006 so far? Not just technique (although not excluding technique).

My favorite so far is Window Seat by Julianne Kost. But I'm really looking forward to reading Maggie Taylor's Landscape of Dreams.

Mastering Black and White Digital Photography, Michael Freeman.

This book presents the most comprehensive collection of BW methods (Photoshop), commentary and content I've come across -- and I have several books of this nature. It really helped me connect a lot of conceptual and procedural dots.

Very little info on BW printing, however, which is a tricky game in and of itself.