Looking for great books and website links

Hello, this is my first post on these forums, and I'm a student of 3D graphics, sculpture, and computer science. I would love to know where I could find some great sources of information on modelling and sculpting techniques, as well as information on terms/lingo and technical information concerning anything 3d graphics; I'm aiming to know a little bit of everything. To be specific, I would like to learn more about NURBS curves, particle systems and lighting in 3d environments, as an example. I hope at least someone here can save me some time and reveal a wealth of info that may otherwise take some serious digging. Until then, I'll keep looking on my own and I soon hope to upload some of my work to see some opinions on a couple of things I'm starting out with in Maya.