Under $25

We live in a dizzyingly diverse era of great beers. Sorting out the Hefeweizens from the IPAs and the porters from the stouts can feel a little like the Herculean task of cleaning out the Augean stables. Except better, because we're talking about beer and not … animal byproducts. That's why the budding beer aficionado in your life will smile when you hand him a gift-wrapped copy of James Waller's "Drinkology Beer: A Book About the Brew" (340 pages, Stewart, Tabori & Chang, $22.50).

It offers an admirably comprehensive dictionary of beer styles as well as an informative history of that magical elixir. (Did you know that Richmond was a pioneering test market for canned beer just six months after Prohibition ended?) For brave DIY beer lovers, Waller even includes information on home brewing (although he recommends getting "a big, fat book on the subject" before setting out on a home-brewing odyssey).

You don't have to drink your morning tea from a vintage Masterpiece Theater mug to know that society was more civilized back in Jane Austen's day. But the world's not as wise as you, is it? Here's a stocking-stuffer suggestion for your ne'er-do-well, pierced-and-tattooed nieces: Margaret C. Sullivan's "The Jane Austen Handbook: Proper Life Skills from Regency England" (224 pages, Quirk, $16.95).

By merely perusing its illustrated pages, your miscreant relatives will gain valuable knowledge of such topics as "How a Lady Might Spend Her Leisure Time," "How to Indicate Interest in a Gentleman Without Seeming Forward" and "How to Behave at a Dinner Party." And should the miscreants find themselves unexpectedly interested in the divine Jane's novels, Sullivan provides a short Austen biography as well as information about her fiction.

Have you been embarrassed by your male friends' inability to throw a good punch, order a cocktail with panache or generally comport themselves in a manly, adult manner? Paul O'Donnell's "Man Up! 367 Classic Skills for the Modern Guy" (325 pages, Artisan, $14.95) could help them … well, man up .

In addition to improving their pugilistic prowess (hint: "don't swing your fist, drive it, aiming at a point a foot or so past his chin or mouth"), O'Donnell will set them straight on how to "drift like they do in 'The Fast and the Furious" as well as explicating how, exactly, to go about stopping a sailboat. It's not just about achieving a confident swagger, though. O'Donnell also offers tips on cleaning products and reduction sauces. Contemporary men live in a complicated world, it seems.

Let's say you hate snakes and the outdoors. Now, let's take it a step further: Your elderly, box wine-swilling father loves snakes and the outdoors. And you've agreed to spend three days with him in the swamps of southern Michigan looking for … that's right: snakes. Would you go through with it?

John Sellers did. And he lived to write about it in "The Old Man and the Swamp: A True Story About My Weird Dad, a Bunch of Snakes, and One Ridiculous Road Trip" (201 pages, Simon & Schuster, $14). Sellers's account shifts smoothly and amusingly between the muggy, bug-infested present and his less than idyllic childhood (his father's low-paying career as a herpetologist caused friction at home). No worries: Before it ends, snakes and reconciliation will be found.

Has enough time passed since the dark days of anti-French rhetoric and the call for "freedom fries" to allow us to return to our sometime-francophilic ways? If so, here's the perfect gift for the traveler contemplating a trip to the City of Light: Olivier Magny's "Stuff Parisians Like" (280 pages, Berkley, $15).

Magny, who runs a wine-tasting school as well as a wine bar in Paris (how French!), mixes street-level anthropology and useful travel tips to describe Parisian life. And he pokes fun at Parisians in a way that might be comforting for wary Americans. An example: "There are few things Parisians like as much as discovering a night sky sprinkled with stars. Coming out of a house after a nice dinner, coming out of a car after a long drive, the Parisian is caught off guard by the disdainful beauty of the night. He finds himself charmed and thrilled by this view that exceeds him. Finally something does."

Books of lists are the tapas of the publishing world: They offer a lot of entertainment on a small plate. Books that offer risqué lists are in another category altogether. Forget trendy Spanish eateries. A book like Karl Shaw's "10 Ways to Recycle a Corpse and 100 More Dreadfully Distasteful Lists" (319 pages, Three Rivers Press, $10.99) is akin to sneaking a Big Mac into a vegan convention.

Sure, we know we should be reading Michael Lewis's "The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine," but how can we pass up "5 Famous People with Irregular Genitalia"? Or "5 People Who Drank Someone Else's Urine" and "10 Famous People Who Were Fond of Taking Their Clothes Off in Public"? Let's face it. A lot of books given as holiday gifts never get read. But this one will, guaranteed.

The English language contains more than 1 million words, Rod L. Evans writes in "Thingamajigs and Whatchamacallits: Unfamiliar Terms for Familiar Things" (210 pages, Perigee, $12.95). So you can't be blamed for not knowing them all. Happily, Evans has collected some of the more obscure ones.

Did you know, for example, that "a metal or plastic tube fixed around each end of a shoelace" is called an aglet? Or that "a raised platform on which a coffin lies in state during a funeral or memorial service" is called a catafalque? Language-obsessed friends and family are sure to enjoy perusing the entries, as will you. This is the sort of gift book you read before wrapping it up and passing it along to its official reader. You will almost certainly be entertained, and it might even be educational.

Quick — can you sing the Preamble to the U.S. Constitution? Sure you can, if you grew up watching "Schoolhouse Rock!" videos. Back in the 1970s and 1980s, they ran on Saturday morning TV, and they eventually helped some of us pass our government and English classes. (Remember "Conjunction Junction"?) Saturday morning TV also was home to less useful (but still fun) content, such as "The Shazam! / Isis Hour" and "The Banana Splits Adventure Hour."

Precious memories, right? As Gael Fashingbauer Cooper and Brian Bellmont write in "Whatever Happened to Pudding Pops? The Lost Toys, Tastes & Trends of the'70s &'80s" (230 pages, Perigee, $12.95), "Those are goofy decades to embrace, with their avocado refrigerators and wood-paneled rec rooms, their leg warmers and shoulder pads." But hey: They were yours. A great nostalgia-inducing gift for fellow members of Generation X.

Fans of Tim Dorsey's hilarious crime novels starring Serge Storms won't be surprised to learn that their favorite misunderstood serial killer loves Christmas. After all, it's the season of giving.

In his new madcap adventure, "When Elves Attack" (194 pages, William Morrow, $16.99), Serge — off his meds again — promises to take Christmas "big!" Among his felonious good deeds: reaping revenge on a thief who targeted a Veterans of Foreign Wars post and assuring that a disgraced hedge fund manager gets his comeuppance. Who could object? Think of it as the Marx Brothers if they could curse and kill people.

Want to make a seasoned golfer cry tears of joy? Give him a copy of "World Atlas of Golf: The Greatest Courses and How They Are Played" (320 pages, Hamlyn, $24.99). This large-format paperback is an impressive reworking of a series that first drew critical acclaim in 1976. It features 80 courses from around the world, with stunning, computer-generated artworks of their layouts, beautiful photography and detailed information about the challenges they offer.

 Golf architecture has changed significantly since the first edition of the book appeared, in part to accommodate new materials and advances in technology.  This new edition documents some of those changes, along with offering a broader look at how golf architecture has changed over the course of centuries.