I hope this isn't too late.
I can't comment about higgimonster's books but he's right; use the library as much as you can.
I'm building a car from scratch so I have looked through a few books. You can see some of them on my page, under the "books & plans" section. But to answer your question:
Carrol Smith is godlike. "Tune to Win" was excellent. Also if you become a member of SAE (SAE.org) you get 20% off of their books. It pays for itself after the first time. They have Smith's whole set.
As for a good suspension book, I really like Chassis Engineering, by Herb Adams. I can tell you it's not dumbed down at all. There are no big formulas but you'll learn a lot. At the end he has a series of chassis build with wooden sticks, and shows the effect of different mods.