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Need a clue? Here it is:

How do you ask a reptile a question?

Give up? Click on the image or photo credit and then, if you want to know more, read more on the topic.

Wordless Wednesday and About.com's Wordless Wednesday

Hanukkah starts at sundown on Friday December 11.

Hanukkah (Hanukah / Hanuka / Chanukah) is a festival of lights that is symbolized by the candelabrum known as a menorah. I recently read that menorah refers to a candelabrum with one too few candles and is not the right term; that chanukiah is to be preferred, but I don't know. Do you? If so, please comment.

Hanukkah celebrates a lighting miracle when one night's worth of oil lit candles for 8 days. Special foods and gift-giving are also a part of Hanukkah.

See Winter Holidays, including Hanukkah

If you're still looking for holiday gift suggestions, you might consider giving a book. Here is a list of most of the book reviews on this site from 2009:

• 428 A.D.
• Ancient Epic
• Betray the Night (fiction)
• Civilizations of Ancient Iraq
• Cleopatra and Antony
• Empires of the Silk Road
• Helen of Troy From Homer to Hollywood
• History of Rome, A
• History of the Ancient Near East ca. 3000-323 B.C., A
• How Rome Fell
• In the Courts of the Sun (fiction)
• Last Ember, The (fiction)
• Poison King, The
• Spartacus War, The
• Whose Culture? The Promise of Museums and the Debate Over Antiquities
• Writing: Theory and History of the Technology of Civilization

Looking back at these books, I tried to decide which were my favorites. My favorite of the fiction books was The Last Ember. This choice was fairly easy. The Maya fiction was pretty good, but it is part of a series, while The Last Ember stands alone. Of the non-fiction, the choice is much harder and much more subjective. I learned a lot from many of them, but the one that was the most eye-opening for me was the one whose book cover I selected, Empires of the Silk Road. There were many excellent books here, not the least of which were How Rome Fell, Ancient Epic, and The Poison King, but the material in them was basically familiar.

Which Book Would You Recommend?

In a new graphic novel, published by First Second and coming out in January, Zeus has to fight his way into Tartarus to rescue his uncles the Hekatonchieres (Ἑκατόγχειρες) and Cyclops to help him in his battle against their brothers the Titans. They had been imprisoned there by their own father, Cronos. Tartarus served as an Underworld prison that was guarded by a female named Kampe. Read more...