As the new year looms, many working in the world of business will start to consider what their goals for the forthcoming year should be. A common new year's resolution in this regard will be to read more business books.

So, what have been the big business titles this year and what books are expected to sell well in 2006? There is little doubt that this has been the year of Freakonomics.

The book, by Steve Levitt and Stephen Dubner, has helped to introduce a whole new phrase into the modern lexicon.

It has also topped business bestseller lists all over the world, with Irish retailers reporting huge interest in its subject matter.

Freakonomics studies the riddles of every day life, frequently asking what seem like obscure questions, as a means of encouraging the reader to view economics - and the modern world - in a new way.

Why do drug dealers still live with their mothers? How much do parents really matter? What do schoolteachers and sumo wrestlers have in common? And which is more dangerous, a gun or a swimming pool? These are among some of the more intriguing questions which it asks.

Another strong performer has been The World is Flat by New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman. The book, which won the inaugural Financial Times/ Goldman Sachs business book of the year award earlier this year, outlines the challenges and benefits of globalisation.

It argues that the world has entered a new phase of globalisation, based on disruptive social, political and technological events at the end of the 20th century.

Friedman believes this offers companies and individuals unprecedented opportunities to collaborate and compete more successfully.

However, those who fail to adapt to this changed situation will suffer the consequences, he also warns.

Other popular business books shortlisted for the UK-based award included The travels of a T-shirt by Pietra Rivoli, which charts the progress of a T-shirt around the world as a means of examining the major issues of the globalisation debate, and Disneywar by James B. Stewart, outlining the trials and tribulations of one of the world's most dominant media corporations.

At home, business books with a consumer theme also performed remarkably well this year. The runaway winner in this category in Ireland was unquestionably Eddie Hobbs's Short Hands, Long Pockets.

No doubt spurred on by the success of his Rip-off Republic series on RTÉ last autumn, it had already achieved sales of 45,000 before the end of the lucrative Christmas sales period. Royalties from sales of the book are to be donated to charity.

Seán O'Boyle, managing director of Currach Press, puts the success of the book - which offers insights into how to save money and control spending - down to Hobbs's "easy style" of explaining financial issues to a mainstream audience.

Several books outlining the success of entrepreneurs and businesses have also caught the public imagination this year.

Examples include Making Bread by Brody Sweeney of O'Brien's Irish Sandwich Bars; Renault Ireland entrepreneur Bill Cullen's Golden Apples, offering "six simple steps" to success; and Mercier Press's The Unsinkable Entrepreneur by technology millionaire Enda O'Coineen.

Mercier also says the inspirational Making it Happen by Mark Pollock, with Ross Whitaker, has been a big seller for it this year.

Similarly, retailers report strong reader interest in two books charting the rise of the internet search engine Google: The Search: How Google and Its Rivals Rewrote the Rules of Business and Transformed Our Culture by John Battelle, and The Google Story by David Vise with Mark Malseed.

Other areas of particular interest are titles which offer investment and spending advice. This is particularly true at a time when more Irish people than ever have spare cash to spend, but are also increasing their levels of debt.Similarly, books explaining the complexities of economics, such as Free Lunch: Easily Digestible Economics by David Smith, have once again been popular this year.

But Freakonomics has been "far and away" Hodges Figgis's biggest selling business book this year, according to Liam Donnelly of Hodges Figgis Ireland.

His counterpart in Eason's, Alan Johnston, agrees that 2005 has been a year where personal finance titles have enjoyed significant success.

"You can see how much personal finance means to people. It's personal finance that is driving the charts," he says.

Yet predicting what will be the big sellers next year can be difficult, as frequently such titles "come from nowhere", he says.

Of the upcoming releases, he predicts that legendary financier George Soros's new book George Soros On Freedom should do well.

Also coming up in February is The Apprentice Revisited by Alan Sugar, which will accompany the second series of the successful TV show on BBC, and Cracking the Millionaire Code: Your Key to Enlightened Wealth by Mark Victor Hansen and Robert Allen.

Both books are expected to do well, Johnston says.

Unsurprisingly, business publishers are also anxious to find the next Freakonomics. One such book, The Undercover Economist by Tim Harford, is already being billed as Britain's answer to Freakonomics, Johnston says. Already published in the United States, it should perform extremely well when it is released here in March.

Donnelly agrees that Harford's book will probably be a big seller in the coming months, as it will cover similar ground to its predecessor.

However, he also points out that the appetite among Irish reades for consumer-oriented guides will more than likely continue.

This is perhaps best illustrated by the fact that perennial titles such as Family Finance by Colm Rapple, and the Taxation Advice Bureau's TAB Guide 2005, will once again be bestsellers.