Fredericksburg.com - Pick up last minute, can't-miss book gifts

STILL CASTING about for the perfect gift book for your young readers? Here are a few suggestions from the best new books of 2006.
For tweens and teens who love the International Spy Museum in Washington, check out "Secrets, Lies, Gizmos and Spies, a History of Spies and Espionage" by Jane Wyman Coleman.

This colorful volume offers photographs of famous spies and their tools, definitions of terms like "pocket litter" (items in a spy's pocket that support the cover or legend), and dozens of tidbits about spies, ranging from Hannibal to Moses to the Navajo code talkers. Ages 10 to 14.
Animal lovers will fall in love with the cuddly creature in Sy Montgomery's "Quest for the Tree Kangaroo, an Expedition to the Cloud Forest of New Guinea.

" In a place where ferns are as big as trees, vines and moss hang from branches, and "we half expect a hobbit or a troll to show up," scientist Lisa Dabek finds a remarkable creature that looks like a bear, climbs like a monkey, and sports a kangaroo's pocket.
Nic Bishop's photographs of the endearing tree kangaroo and the spectacular forest are worth the price of admission, but the story Montgomery tells about how scientists do their work is inspiring, too. Ages 10-14.

Pop-up books abound this year. Robert Sabuda has followed up last year's dinosaur pop-up with "Encyclopedia Prehistorica: Sharks and Other Sea Monsters." Kids who already love sharks will love them even more when the sharks leap up from the page, teeth foremost.

The paper engineering is nothing short of spectacular. Ages 8 up.
"Toys Go Out: Being the Adventures of a Knowledgeable Stingray, a Toughy Little Buffalo, and Someone Called Plastic" by Emily Jenkins is firmly in the tradition of Winnie the Pooh.

In this case, three toys experience many of the same fears, jealousies and pleasures young children do. Stingray "sometimes says she knows things when she doesn't," Lumphy is sturdy but shy, and Plastic eventually discovers she is a ball. The three compete for affection from the little girl (lucky the toys who get to sleep on her bed), and enjoy the excitement of traveling to school in a backpack and enduring the scary but oddly enjoyable ride in Frank, the washing machine.

Ages 5-8.

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