Every Christmas or Hanukkah one child gets a gift that engages almost all of the relatives gathered for the holiday. One year it may be an air hockey table, the next a keyboard with percussion buttons.
This year it could be one of several reference books just published. They invite readers of any age to browse, and they offer one advantage over the stuff available on CD-ROM: You can read them in the bedroom, the bathroom, anywhere serious browsing takes place.
* Start with "How the Body Works: 100 Ways Parents and Kids Can Share the Miracle of the Human Body" by Steve Parker (Reader's Digest, $25, 195 pages, ages 8 and up). This is a fascinating book packed with facts and experiments kids can do to learn more about everything -- from how we digest fats to how hard our hearts work.
There are tons of graphics -- my favorite is a series of four drawings showing how bones heal -- and color photographs of kids doing the various experiments, step by step. Most suggest that an adult supervise, although there are plenty that trustworthy middle-schoolers can do on their own. If the kids start asking for candles, a Pyrex cup and a coping saw, it's time to start supervising.
This book explains sneezes, yawns and hiccups. It teaches how to make a set of model lungs (using a large plastic soda bottle, balloons and a three-way hose connector) that would serve as a fine science fair project. There are experiments to test reflexes, taste buds and short-term memory. The glossary is super.
* Kids curious about science also will enjoy "How on Earth: A Question-and-Answer Book About How Animals and Plants Live" Ronald Orenstein (Voyageur Press, $15.95, ages 7-12).
It's not the place to go one-stop shopping for research on a homework assignment. Rather, it's a browser's delight, with sharp photographs and one- or two-paragraph descriptions of various animals and plants from all over the world, answering questions such as: How does a hedgehog roll into a ball? What is a termite society like? How can seals stay underwater for so long? How did people save the peregrine falcon?
* It costs as much as a CD-ROM and weighs as much as a laptop computer. "The Young Reader's Companion to American History," edited by John A. Garraty (Houghton Mifflin, $39.95, 964 pages, ages 11 and up), is worth it.
It's the best reference work on American history I've come across in five years of reviewing kids' books. Arranged as an encyclopedia, it's crammed with biographies of everyone from Dean Acheson to Florenz Ziegfeld. And anyone important who doesn't have his or her own entry is bound to be mentioned in one of the subject articles.
The depth and breadth is remarkable. And so is much of the writing, by more than 150 contributors. Julian Bond wrote the entry on the civil rights movement. Dee Brown profiles Sitting Bull. And many of the finest authors of children's nonfiction are here: Milton Meltzer on child labor, Brent Ashabrenner on immigration, Russell Freedman on Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt.
Women and minorities are covered extensively. The entry on Margaret Mead is the same length as the one on H. L. Mencken. Same for Babe Didrikson Zaharias and Babe Ruth. There are 327 black-and-white photos (including one of Ollie North with the Iran-contra entry), 59 color illustrations, 14 maps, the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. This is definitely a keeper.
* To give younger readers a glimpse of a few famous people, there's "My First Book of Biographies: Great Men and Women Every Child Should Know" by Jean Marzollo, illustrated by Irene Trivas (Scholastic, $14.95, 80 pages, ages 3-7).
The subtitle is bound to provoke arguments, because with only 45 profiles, there are plenty of great men and women left out. It's a very subjective collection that includes Rachel Carson, Marie and Pierre Curie, Walt Disney, Elizabeth I, Duke Ellington, Mohandas Gandhi, Yo-Yo Ma and Sequoya as well as George Washington, Winston Churchill and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.
* A great one-size-fits-all gift for anyone in elementary school is "The Dorling Kindersley Children's Illustrated Dictionary" by John McIlwain (Dorling Kindersley, $19.95, 256 pages, ages 7-11).
It defines more than 5,000 words, using more than 3,000 color photographs and illustrations. It opens with clear introductions to the different parts of speech, instructions on how to use a dictionary and four pages of word games to play with the help of the book.
The photos and illustrations help explain some of the more abstract concepts. Concentrate, for example, shows a girl puzzling over a Rubik's cube, beneath the definition: "to think carefully about something."
The photographs are multi-ethnic, and even though the person depicted as a doctor is male, the surgeon and the veterinarian are female. There's a two-page spread of abbreviations -- including ROM, CD and HMO, but no FBI -- plus helpful guides to spelling and prefixes and suffixes. Another keeper.
* Signing sighting: Two Baltimore area authors, Jerdine Nolan ("Harvey Potter's Balloon Farm") and Annette Barnes ("The Baby Grand, the Moon in July, and Me"), will be signing books at the Catonsville Community College Library's fourth annual book fair, noon to 4 p.m. Dec. 9, on the main floor of the library. The other local author appearing will be William Gildea ("When the Colts Belonged to Baltimore"). All proceeds benefit the library. Sales are cash or check only, and gift wrapping is available.