1

An ornamental prayer book of Roll on "Random Godly Domains"  with illuminated pages and semiprecious stones.

2

Ars Optica: An ophthalmic guide that’s treasured by magicians, who read its dull and technical pages not for purposes of spectacle manufacturer, but for the construction of resonance spheres; Pressurized, lensed devices used in the contact of alien realms.

3

A book the size of a large man’s hand, composed of ten plates of blue-black jade mounted in thin silver and bound with black silk lacing. Each plate is inscribed in silver with charts of the night sky.

4

The Book of Math: What seems like a boring book about maths problems is in fact all about Mathom, the God of Delays, and has this title because the author was distracted and unable to finish said title. It contains all sorts of important information on Mathom and His Priests, but is frustratingly not completely finished, as it seems that the author was unable or unwilling to finish it. Knowledgeable PC’s are aware that the books is very rare, as only a few copies were ever successfully made before first the printing press broke, then the ink supply ran out, and then the printers were raided by the police by mistake, then the building caught fire…

5

My Life as a Gnome Bodyguard: A moderately-sized autobiography of Mifierwa Cinibnil, a gnome paladin that served as the protector of Queen Evelyn Crystaldown.

6

A very old book of coastal charts, which has obviously seen heavy shipboard use in the past; the pages are marked and stained and smell faintly of salt. Next to an unnamed island on a map of a distant coast, an unsteady hand has drawn a deaths-head marker and scrawled: “blaydes dont cutt em but fires wil burn em upp.”

7

Blood  Debt Ledger: A small book bound in wolf hide and decorated with the beast’s claws and fangs. It has ninety-nine pages, each with nine names inscribed on it. Knowledgeable PC’s can discern that it originally belonged to a hag who used it to record the names of those who owed her a debt.

8

Tippy’s Gardening Tips and Tricks: A farmer’s almanac, focusing on the cultivation of herbs and their various medical and culinary uses.

9

A large instructional manual entitled “195 Easy Projects with Human Skin”. Knowledgeable PC’s are aware of its notoriety for its gruesome, yet imaginatively intricate, woodblock illustrations.

10

A small personal journal penned by a hunter of the supernatural. Although the majority of the pages are too bloodied, dirty, burned or torn to be legible, a cluster of pages near the middle detail the process of an infernal summoning ritual. The book describes that a specific order of fiend can be called into the world by digging a hole in the dead center of a set of crossroads and burying a box containing a picture of the mortal wishing to make the deal, some graveyard dirt, and a bone from a black cat. This specific type of “crossroads demon” looks like a human except for their blood red eyes and are tasked with ‘buying’ souls for Hell through deals with mortals. The demon can grant the summoner’s wish in exchange for ownership over that person’s soul, resulting in the person dying and going to Hell to be transformed into a demon upon death.

11

A History of Tea: A book bound with tea stained wood that (As its title proclaims) is a comprehensive history of tea, a plant first discovered and cultivated in the Northern land of Awn, where it remains most popular. A History of Tea denotes the conflicts, agricultural developments, and serving preferences surrounding tea over the last two millennia. Helpfully, the book contains a list of all herbs and barks capable of being steeped in addition to black tea. It is a hearty reference document for travelers and adventurers in need of a hot brew, regardless of its origin or quality.

12

Brobson’s Guide to Decoys: A gamesmans’ guide, devoted to fishing flies, wooden ducks, and other such beast lures. Written in unceasingly-energetic confidence about their use, history, composition, and construction. A book treasured by hunters of prey both mundane and monstrous, as it contains details for luring both plant-eaters and predators of varied size. Many a fisherman has thanked Brobson for his wooly bugger lure, as have countless cutters for his pattern for false goats, which is much cheaper than buying an actual goat.

13

A book on the proper ways to do mundane domestic chores written in large simple words similar to a scholarly document. Simple pictures take up many of the pages and it is probably meant to be used as a reference guides to young maids and scullery girls. An extremely perceptive reader will discern the book’s true purpose. When held to the light, hidden writing is exposed revealing a list of assassins, thieves, fences, sellers of illicit goods, safe houses and other black-market connections that can be found in the nearest capital city.

14

Identification of Irritants; A Gentleman’s Guide to Avoiding Discomfort in the Field: A guidebook that proved to be too good for the purposes it was designed for by providing in depth identification guides, descriptions of growing conditions, and technical analyses of the properties of many dangerous plants, including several very rare and incredibly poisonous ones. Someone has scribbled recipes for several dangerous poisons derived from some of these plants in the margins.

15

A brown, leather-bound tome with the image of a knight emblazoned on the cover. When opened the book contains a riveting story of a knight, a princess, a dragon, and a kingdom in peril.

16

Practical Exercises for Young Magicians: An instructional book written by Amelia Popper containing intricate finger and voice exercises divided into several dozen etudes for magicians. The book consists of detailed charts and a series of movements that serve as educational practices and introductory techniques to the physical complexity of magic and spell casting. Popper’s work has been used throughout many mage academy curriculums as a structured, refined method to spellcasting.

17

Manual of Flesh Golems: A thick tome imbued with magical properties and stamped with arcane symbols on the cover. The book contains theoretical musings on the construction and control of golems. It goes into some detail on how the reader may construct a servant of assembled, animated flesh which will obey the creator without question.

18

A small, thick sea captain’s journal. Leather bound and filled with dense, near unreadable notes. The cover has a piece of lead shot embedded deep into it from a run-in with pirates.

19

Magical Bleed and the Effects of Lingering Aura: A tome of arcane theory that introduces and focuses on Sir Bleepin Loopfoodle’s Model of Epi-Magical Exchange. The detailed treatise describes how magical leftovers from a spell changes the environment and soul and the impacts can differed based on the nature of the spell. The book contains examples on how intensely supernatural creatures such as venerable dragons, elder aberrations and extraplanar outsiders (Such as celestials, elementals and fiends) passively affect their environment.

20

The Faerie Queen: A vastly underappreciated collection of Light Cottonstream’s poems about the summer court, detailing the queen’s affairs, courting at the summer court, and the involvement of love potions.

21

Wintering with Wizards: A hard-bound, extravagant, lengthy volume chronicling the adventures of the author, Earnest Holcomb, during his stay at a wizard’s school over a long winter. It’s clear to any wizard that the author hasn’t a clue what he’s talking about.

22

A Comprehensive Encyclopedic Approach to All Things Draconic: A massive and richly illustrated compendium of dragon lore that covers nearly all areas of knowledge pertaining to dragonkind. With various sections devoted to prismatic, metallic, and rare dragon breeds (As well as smaller sections on drakes, half-dragons, dragonborn, and even wyverns) this is likely the most thorough text on the subject. Not many copies of the book exist and it is coveted among collectors and curators alike; finding a copy and the access to read it can be an expensive venture on its own.

23

Pendlesea’s Scroll Compendium of Scrolls: An exceptionally long and somewhat stiff scroll safely kept within the confines of a dark leather scroll container about two feet long and four inches in diameter. The scroll contains the rambling treatise of a slightly crazed wizard named Bidoop Pendlesea. The treatise examines the various uses of scrolls and the not-so-subtle embellishment of their claimed superiority to books by the author.

24

A brand-new copy of “Volo’s Guide to What to Expect When You’re Expecting” with advice and guides on humanoid pregnancy. A big brightly colored “Congratulations!” is written on the inside cover and the chapter summary pages are dog-eared.

25

A thick wood-bound chapbook of gnomish jokes.

26

A leather-bound book detailing the complete genealogy of a noble family.

27

An illustrated travelogue of remote and exotic locations rumored to include sigils for teleportation circles hidden in the text.

28

A pocket-sized book devoted to the ancestry and heraldry of the vampiric Bloodlines of Erubescence. This copy has been annotated with cutting remarks about the various families, sometimes revealing embarrassing gossip or secrets.

29

A slightly tattered but complete copy of a rare first printing of the Saga of the Sacred Cauldron, a chivalric romance recounting a quest in the realm of Elfhame involving such colorful characters as Bellstajj the Capacious, Blue-Eyed Molly, Fennrix the Blind, Fun Guy the Barbarian, the Knight of Harts Petalu Morriden, Susurrus Psithurisma, Weevil Stench, Wick the Silent, and the notorious Sparks & Mud.

30

A stained manuscript containing fan fiction for the popular and long-running Wendolyn the Werewolf sequence of serialized romantic novels.

31

Noland’s Small Book of Portals Vol III: The work contains a collection of fine lithographs of man-made, natural, or magically occurring portals, in good detail as well as their destination. Not all are sized for people to fit through. Many include detailed description and measurements, and might prove useful for a magic user or scholar of the arcane looking to understand the planes and magical travel better; this may be for good or ill.

32

Seven Jistkan Forms of Ancient Hygh Majiks: A thread-bare tome, with pages that are more dust than parchment. Some of the pages are actually made of papyrus and were literally cut out of scrolls and sewn into this work. The runes described inside are incomplete, and use one ancient, dead language, to transcribe the words of an even older and even deader language that was destroyed by a great volcanic explosion. Most of the time the book is spent on the names of the offspring of the offspring of a myriad of gods, with incomplete glyphs and logograms.

33

The Case of the Disappearing Daughters: A historical horror novel that is also known as The Mad Queen and her Daughter, this is the true(ish) story of how the once capable ruler Queen Yocasta of Vallermoore went insane after her daughter’s death, and how the daughters of her subjects were kidnapped to replace her original daughter and then murdered when they failed to be just like her. In the end the Queen went insane, took her dead, decaying daughter from the royal tomb and had her by her side at all times as if she was still alive.

34

A small prayer book with a green leather cover and indecipherable notes in the margins.

35

A large tome bound with unadorned black leather, containing a multitude of jumbled essays, theorems and anecdotes, all of a mystical, slightly odd or perverse nature. The more one reads or uses the book, the more the writing within makes sense but such clarity comes at a horrible price.

36

Dimensions of Evil; A Guidebook to the Nether Realms: A demonhide bound grimoire written in Infernal that provides information relating to the Lower Planes of the Nine Hells. Dimensions of Evil paints a fairly accurate and unflattering view of the Lower Planes and its inhabitants. Due to its subject matters several faiths of good deities have banned this book and attempt to confiscate any copies that appear. Others encourage their followers to read the book, going so far as to create multiple copies.

37

The Theory and Application of Force Magic: A tome that provides information relating to spells involving the use of magical force. Many wizards consider Aeroth Blith’s book the best reference about force magic ever written. Well organized and clearly written, if a little dry and analytical in places, the tome examines force magic as a mysterious power akin to a fifth element. Copies of this book can often be found in universities and larger libraries that cater to war wizards and battle mages.

38

Commoriom: A bound manuscript written in symbols barely recognizable as a script. Its pages number in the hundreds, and splitting the book in two is a single engraving upon a thin sheet of metal; a deserted city square surrounded by tall pillars, and in the middle, a hideous, crooked monstrosity squats as it devours his screaming victims. The image is atrocious, but has some weird magnetism, and if one looks upon it for some time, a weak voice in his head says, “Beware the vile offspring of Knygathin Zhaum.”

39

A children’s book filled with stories of long dead heroes and the sacrifices they made to light the path ahead.

40

De Vermis Mysteriis: A book whose cover is made of black leather with copper insets covered in a green patina. It describes the rituals and tools of priests who seek the worlds that lie beyond. An excerpt of the book reads as follows; “A R'lang is an item that the caster imbues with his soul before travel to the Beyond. To begin, one should find a shell or piece of polished wood on the shore of the ocean. It must be placed in the ground not further than ten paces from the timeline on the 20th day of the lunar month. After exactly nine days, mark the place with two circles and proper signs. Chant thrice the incantation: "Khlu Sya Asa Nmrihg Aym Eghu Akaman” to grant it its powers…“

41

Chaos Theory; A Calculated Cataclysm: A tattered book that seems to have had numerous pages torn from it and perhaps entire chapters. It is hard to be certain as it seems to have been rebound multiple times.

42

Druid’s Staff Quarterly: An intriguing, regularly published journal that appears to have pages made from thin bark; these pages are jagged and irregular.

43

Fish are Friends, Not Food: A strange dietitian guide that encourages the reader to choose alternative protein sources to fish.

44

Grimoire of Devilish Contracting: A worn, leather-bound tome with an oversized silver and gold latch that requires a key to open it. If one can manage to gain access to the text, the reader will find extensive advice on how to broker deals with fiends of the lower planes and get out with one’s soul relatively intact. The volume has no information how to actually summon a devil to bargain with.

45

It’s Hyyyydra-matic!: A peculiar book that contains a bard’s tale of encountering a mighty hydra. It contains over 100 uses for various hydra body parts.

46

Shorthalt’s Journal of Awful Limericks: A well-worn, cloth-bound book inscribed with scrawlings of horrific poems, each of which are imbued with enchantment magic. There are also bizarre, childish drawings of humanoids doing various acts of vile behavior.

47

Tales of a Troglodyte Named Thomas the Truthful: An interesting parable that tells of a Troglodyte named Thomas the Truthful that rose to power in a small Underdark community by virtue of his honesty and good nature.

48

The Arts Alchemical: A Primer: A strange volume fashioned from the hide of some unidentifiable creature. The vellum pages contained within describe the steps to creating a variety of potions.

49

These Furry Fellas: A notebook with beautiful calligraphy that describes the types and habits of various small beasts and critters. The accompanying sketches are quite cute.

50

When Life Gives You Lemons: A simple, single-page pamphlet filled with positive affirmations that emphasize the importance of seizing opportunities.

51

…And the Bear Says…: A worn, small leather journal that appears to be a naturalist’s notes from time spent tracking a family of bears.

52

A is for Aboleth: A rare copy of the famed children’s book. It has simple cartoon pictures and humorous descriptions of monstrous creatures, all the way from A – Aboleth to Z – Zuvembie.

53

A scuffed and well‐worn text written with manticore blood ink on fine linen paper, bound in aged dried leather. It bears the title “Elementary Principles of the Arcane Instrument”.

54

Lords of the Pit; a Guidebook to Devils: A beautifully illustrated book, bound in leather with a pentagram on the cover. It describes the various types of devils with dubious accuracy.

55

Gusty Fintagel’s Most Excellent Miscellany: A cheaply printed chapbook of random facts, lists and bits of trivia. It would be perfect for someone to memorize before a social event and pepper in the information to create an illusion of schooling or worldliness.

56

An obviously handmade bark‐covered annotated scrapbook filled with rare pressed flowers and herbs, and exotic feathers.

57

A blue leather folio entitled “The Fey King of Darkwood and Other Tragedies”. It was written by the celebrated bard and playwright Iancu Petronas.

58

A History of the Lonely Coast: A historical tome written by Brenn Unger, it is a dry account loaded with bias towards the Locher family. The book is of black leather with silver‐bound edges.

59

The Sampalataya: A leather tube containing a long scroll with carved wooden handles. Told horizontally along the scroll is an illustrated epic poem on the birth of the gods of the distant kingdom of Gopura. Unrolling the scroll slowly tells the story.

60

A torture manual bound in skin of dubious provenance, featuring disturbing etchings. It was written and illustrated by the notorious Count Vaklav of Treblik.

61

A heavy tome with a steel scale cover inlaid with carnelians written by Elfric Stonyfist. Entitled “Songs of the Dwarves”, the text contains the traditional versions of classical Dwarven songs as well as detailed stories of their origin.

62

A spellbook bound in basilisk skin, branded with the arcane mark of the wizard Vaskaren a noted abjurer.

63

When the Stars are Right: A book roughly bound in mottled purple leather and marked with a large staring eye. Supposedly written by Idris Bahar, it contains insane ramblings about eldritch beings from the alien realms beyond our own.

64

A book bound in wooden covers, with paintings of flowers and plants decorating the pages. The text contains prayers to the Nature Goddess and details various methods to commune with nature, encourage the growth of plants and speak to animals.

65

The Poems of Caranthir Greenmantle: A blue leather folio decorated with silver, containing twelve loose sheets, each a handwritten poem.

66

Decline and Fall of the Hobgoblin Empire: A painfully dry historical text bound in barghest pelt and set with three sapphires.

67

Common Mycological Meals: A recipe book, all focused around making food out of easily accessible fungi, mosses and mushrooms. Its pages are made out of an unusually textured material with a light-yellow hue.

68

A gruesome manuscript bound in what is probably dwarfskin, judging by the number of hairs still left on it. The text is written in Infernal and entitled “Sculptors of Men”. Even without being able to read the text, it’s clearly full of anatomical diagrams, runes and sigils, alchemical recipes and handwritten marginalia. Knowledgeable PC’s who can read the text are able to determine that it is a manual on how to create flesh golems and animate them through demonic power rather than through arcane or alchemical means. These changes make the construct much cheaper and easier to animate but with exponentially more risk to the creator’s soul and the ease of which the golem can be controlled.

69

A cheap-looking book whose cover bears the image of a handsome half-elf with a cheesy grin splitting his face. Titled “Breaking Through” it is an autobiography of the mildly famous bard Shagwyn Starfellow. The story itself is a turgid, self-aggrandizing affair with occasional spelling errors, anecdotes which are exaggerated far beyond belief, unfounded criticism of his siblings and some of the least funny jokes you can remember having been committed to parchment.

70

A slim volume bound in an orange-red slipcase which feels warm to the touch. Entitled “Elementary Pyromancy” it is written entirely in Infernal. The book contains promisingly detailed arcane symbols, with runes the reader immediately associates with fire and flame.

71

Entitled “The Atlas of Forever” and the bright blue ink seems to crackle on the page, and the reader immediately senses that the book is old and powerful.

72

A black board-bound book with bright bands ribbons. It’s partly unreadable with age. You think it says something like “Arcanus”

73

Hunger More: A book of various legends and fables all of which relate to the origin of the mythical being known as the Frost King. The compilation is entirely written in sylvan and none of the storied are marked as the “correct” version, as if the writer wanted the reader to decide which of them is the true story.

74

Tome of Solis: A spellbook with leather front and backing. On the front is a gold imprint of a magic circle with an image of a lion in the center of the magic circle. All text inside this book is made with gold and is unburnable.

75

A manuscript recounting the memories of a dying dwarf folk hero.

76

A notebook detailing an elvish account of an important treaty being signed over 400 years ago.

77

A girdle book mounted in cobalt leather backing ermine. The book itself is trimmed with brass tabs but the vellum pages are blank.

78

A fragmentary diary of a mercenary recruit who was separated from his squad and died in the local area. According to his own scribbled words he took on a mortal wound and has able to hole up, write his last words and will drink his flask of brandy and try to drift off peacefully.

79

Manual of the Numinous Realms: A book bound in orichalchum, written in silver ink on the finest vellum, and illustrated with strange diagrams that move on their own, the manual describes the interplay of elemental forces and spiritual currents that underlie the illusion we call reality. According to the text, by manipulating these fundamental levers of reality, you may accomplish great feats of magic.

80

A tome is filled with unintelligible runes from languages long forgotten. If somehow deciphered, it details a theory of magic one practiced by those referred to as the “Mejai” who stole the souls of those who opposed them and bound them within objects giving them great power at the cost of the spirit’s eternal torment.

81

A large, leather bound, gold trimmed ledger containing the complete financial information of a duke of the nearby kingdom. The archive goes back five years and the information contained within would be extremely valuable to the duke’s enemies as blackmail. The duke himself would probably offer a reward of some sort on its discrete return.

82

A small lexicon of nautical terms.

83

Travels of a Planeswaler: A cloth-bound book containing lurid tales of seductive genies, underwater cities and fiery snakelike creatures.

84

A tome with a cover promising one hundred wonderful stories. All but one have been torn out.

85

A small journal titled “A Guide To Creating A World Without End”. It always smells like the delicious confectionery known as lokum.

86

The Measure: A massive codex of duties, laws, and crimes, the Measure serves as a guide to a strict, ordered society. The semi-religious text is written and maintained by the militant order known as the Hell Knights. Based upon centuries of legal codes from ancient empires, as well as passages from the strictures of Hell itself, this body of laws extols justness rather than justice.

87

An evil tome of dark construction with wrinkled patches of rough skin that have been sewn together around plates of some hard material that serves as the cover. Bones from two human hands have been fastened to the binding as if cradling the book. It’s is always bone chillingly cold to the touch as if stealing heat from anyone foolish enough to look inside. When opened, it smells of brimstone and copper. Inside, profane diagrams and hideous illustrations accompany spells penned in some fiendish script. Everything is composed in crimson but not in ink. Those who choose to read from it will discover it the spellbook of a powerful necromancer.

88

An old book filled with blank pages. Anything written in these books disappears at sunset.

89

Manifestations Arcanum: A quintessential text written by an archmage from a previous era. This enormous tome outlines the metaphysics of magic, how it works and the divine symbology, sacred geometry and the religious practices involved.

90

A book with no name, but it holds the true history and ascension of an old but very powerful deity.

91

The Clouded Mirror: A encyclopedia of portals and other means of interplanar travel, including secret paths between planes that are not normally considered contiguous, ways to reach and navigate the Far Realm, and instructions to find hidden places that are normally inaccessible.

92

A Deal with the Devil: A tome detailing various historical contracts that have been made with devils. The text goes to great lengths to make it sound as if it were actually very easy to find loopholes in fiendish contracts. Insightful readers suspect that the book may have been written or published by servants of the infernal powers in an effort to lure unwitting souls to believe that they can outwit a demon when the average person is in fact far more likely to lose their soul in an unholy bargain than come out ahead.

93

Death Eternal: A book written by an ancient dwarven smith famous for making cursed blades. It describes rituals needed to create blades that trap the souls of those killed by them, with the blades growing in strength as the number of souls trapped within grows.

94

Under The Silver Moon: A hidebound book that contains information on lycanthropy and the effects that it may bestow upon a creature lucky enough to be gifted it. The author makes lycanthropy sound like a REALLY good idea with little to no downsides.

95

Cooking with Grandma: A seemingly pleasant-sounding cookbook whose first few pages are simple wholesome recipes designed for two people working together. The book was actually written by hags, and the majority of the text goes into great detail explaining how the flesh and bones of older humans can be used to make delicious food.

96

Fall of Revelation: A heretical tome bound in the skin of the author, Hazeomeel (An angel), it describes the celestial’s fall from the heavens because it attempted to use divine prophecy to find which humans could be killed to prevent evil from occurring.

97

The Endless Litany: A thick tome whose every single page of which is filled with the same phrase repeated over and over again “The end is never the end is never the end is never the end”. Despite this monotony, when a creature starts reading from the first page, they can not stop of their own volition, nor will they ever reach the end no matter how long they spend reading it as the book has an infinite number of pages.

98

Paradoxomicon: A bound volume of the collected works of a plane-shifter wizard who has dedicated his life to finding loopholes in magic and testing them in parallel planes of existence, collapsing each one of them in doing so.

99

Jerbe Kendalcanthe’s ‘Love Elixirs’: An alchemical tome detailing the formula and instructions on how to make a highly addictive potion that possesses no benefits other than addiction. The book warns that small villages have been wiped out as every resource is pooled into acquiring the materials needed to produce more.

100

Into the Labyrinth: A tome bound in red leather emblazoned with the symbol of an open flame stamped in gold leaf on the front cover. In a well-practiced, easily readable handwriting, the author had penned a short warning: “This volume is strictly forbidden from being read, except by those ranked at least Bishop or higher in the Church of The Eternal Heavenly Flame. In it are detailed some of the foulest, most pernicious pieces of magic ever devised. This volume only exists in order to offer ways to defeat these spells, in the off chance these heresies ever resurface and must be confronted again. Be warned, the spells grow progressively more deranged towards the end of the book. The original scribe was driven quite insane by recording them, and ended up having to be committed to an asylum.”