Great Big Book of Everything: Difference between revisions
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{{trope}}
[[File:appendix.jpg|link=Don Rosa|
{{quote|''"Our friends need our help! Please turn to the time travel section of your Fireside Girls Handbook."''
|'''Isabella Garcia-Shapiro''', ''[[Phineas and Ferb]]''}}
The '''Great Big Book of Everything''': The one-stop shop for all your plot needs. [[How Do I Shot Web?|Need information]] about the [[New Super Power|super-power you've just been given]]? On the first page. Want to find the only way to kill the [[Big Bad]]? It has a detailed entry.
Whoever wrote this book must have damn-near infinite knowledge. It has all the facts you need and has them at the moment you need them! In fact, it seems like new information just appears in the book all the time, [[Deus Ex Machina|as the plot requires]].
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Compare with [[Library of Babel]] and [[Tomes of Prophecy and Fate]]. Contrast [[Blank Book]].
If it's evil, then it's a [[Tome of Eldritch Lore]]. Supertrope to [[Big Book of War]]. This trope is [[Do-Anything Robot]] in book form - and YOU do the Anything!
{{examples}}▼
▲{{examples}}
== Anime
* Yue's power in ''[[Mahou Sensei Negima]]'' is this, complete with an actual book that finds everything she needs. In ''Negima!?'', Nodoka's "Armor" power has the same ability.
** Material in the manga (vol. 16) reveals that it's actually tapping in a magical 'net, which can be both an advantage and a flaw: Information is always up-to-date, but you risk losing data [[Wikipedia|"arbitrarily deemed of lesser importance"]]
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== Comic Books ==
* The Junior Woodchuck Guidebook in Disney's ''[[The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck|Uncle Scrooge]]'' comics (and subsequently in ''[[DuckTales (1987)]]'') (and any other Duck story where it is needed. It is always there when a Junior Woodchuck needs it). A lengthy [[Don Rosa]] story-arc once revealed that it had been condensed from the entire content of the Great Library of Alexandria (with the lost history of South America and Asia added later). The library was a storehouse of ancient knowledge that was tragically lost to history through a series of disasters, culminating in a fire during the time of the Roman Empire.
** The aspect of the Guide containing more text than could possibly fit into a single volume is usually explained by saying that there are actually numerous volumes that make up the complete Guide, just like any large encyclopedia. How they always happen to have exactly the volumes of the Guide applicable to the topic at hand, though, is [[Hand Wave|handwaved]].
** One ''[[Donald Duck]]''-magazine story had Donald getting annoyed at the book's seemingly infinite wisdom and asked the Woodchucks about who the author was. Cue panic as not even the top generals know. They then had to keep Donald tied up so he would not go to the newspaper with the information that "the Woodchucks follow advice that could as well be made up". In the end they ''do'' find the author's house, but decide that knowing who he is will ruin the magic behind the mystery. The shadowy author is then seen looking at them as they leave, contemplating that "if my book contains better knowledge than that, then I don't know it myself".
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* The Abstract in ''[[Runaways]]''
* Marvel Comic's [[Doctor Strange]] owns (or owned) the ''[[White Magic|Book of the Vishanti]]'', containing any spell or obscure tidbit of mystical information he might need. There is also its opposite [[Black Magic|''The Darkhold'']]. Each contains spells or information to perfectly counter something in the other.
* [[Neil Gaiman]]'s ''[[The Sandman]]'' series features Destiny of the Endless, who has a book chained to his arm that details everything that has ever happened, or ever will happen. The cover of this tome is made of the [[Insubstantial Ingredients| hide of a beast that never existed.]]
* One appeared in ''[[Final Crisis]]: Superman Beyond'', and was so heavy that Superman and Captain Marvel working together could barely lift it.
* The Absorbacon in [[Silver Age]] ''[[Hawkman]]'' comics.
== Fan
* Parodied in the ''[[Kingdom Hearts]]'' fanfic ''[[Those Lacking Spines]]'' with the ever-handy guidebook which contains anything the protagonists need to know about a given world.
* In the ''[[Total Drama Island]]'' fanfic ''[[Keepers of the Elements]]'', there are The Elemental Books which contains all sorts of spells which each Keeper along the line either invented or improved upon.
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* ''[[Mirror Mask]]'' both [[lampshade]]s and plays this straight with ''A Really Useful Book''. The book, a small pocket sized volume that appears to have some degree of sentience, consists of various pieces of advice written on its pages. In addition, the book always opens the relevant page. {{spoiler|In fact, after Helena is forced to tear out most of the book's pages, the ''one page'' she didn't tear out still contains a piece of relevant advice. A repeated piece of advice, but still useful.}}
** More obviously lampshaded, yet (somehow) simultaneously played straighter, with a book Helena comes across earlier in the same library: ''The Complete History of Everything''.
* Tobin's Spirit Guide from ''[[Ghostbusters]]'' and its related media. In the second movie, Egon also references a book of occult history called ''Magicians, Martyrs, and Madmen''.
* Dana Carvey's ''Master of Disguise'' features a pop-up book which provides extremely specific information relating to any situation at hand on whichever page is randomly opened to.
* ''[[Beetlejuice]]'' - Handbook for the Recently Deceased
* The Book of Secrets from the second ''[[National Treasure]]'' movie. Filled with almost everything a [[Conspiracy Theorist|conspiracy nut]] would love, and more on top of that. Most importantly the information the team is currently looking for, and, a hidden detail on page 47, which may come into play in the third film, if one ever comes out.
* Max's dream journal from ''[[The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl]]''.
== Literature ==
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* Dorothy Ann in ''[[The Magic School Bus]]'' always carried a book she called her "research" that conveniently had information about the day's subject matter.
* Subverted in '' The City of Dreaming Books'' by Walter Moers. The [[Big Bad]] gives the hero an old Grimoire and tells him that all the answers to his question are written on page 333. {{spoiler|the page only contains on sentence, over and over again: You have just been poisoned.}}
** This is a recasting of one of the tales of the Arabian Nights, "[https://web.archive.org/web/20140831150134/http://preview.tinyurl.com/25dgrhg The Story of Yunan and The Sage Duban]", one of the tales nested in the "Tale of the Fisherman and the Jinn". It also involves tricking someone into turning the pages in a book that has been poisoned.
* Susan Cooper's ''[[The Dark Is Rising]]'' has The Book of Gramarye which gives the Old Ones everything they ever wanted to know about how to use their powers.
* ''[[Harry Potter (novel)|Harry Potter]]'':
** [[Harry Potter and
** Justified, it was Snape's old text-book which he improved with his personal notes, and while it's never stated how good is he at Potion Crafting compared to other experts in the topic, he seems to be quite knowledgeable in it, also said spell was unique and Snape seemed to take quite some pride for inventing it.
** It's also quite remarkable how much plot-relevant information can be found in ''Hogwarts: A History''.
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* ''The Book of Three'' from The ''[[Prydain Chronicles]]'' (also the name of the first book of the series) serves this purpose, being the chronicled [[Rule of Three|Past, Present, and Future]] of Prydain. It was once referred to as the "Book of If" by [[Eccentric Mentor|Dallben]], who mentioned that the prophecies in the book could easily have not occurred. Oh, and it has magic smiting powers to keep away the unworthy.
* In ''[[The Girl Who Owned a City]]'', Lisa is stated to be guided by a "great book," which gives her most of her ideas on how to run things her [[Cozy Catastrophe|post-Apocalyptic]] kid enclave. The book is implied to be ''[[Atlas Shrugged]].''
* ''[https://web.archive.org/web/20140611075234/http://www.annecoale.com/web4pics/bookofsand.pdf The Book of Sand]'' by Jorge Luis Borges is a short story about the titular book, so named because "neither sand nor this book has a beginning or end". The book is of unknown origin and has seemingly infinite pages, which are numbered non-consecutively with arbitrarily large numbers; one page number was mentioned as being a number raised to the ninth power. There is no way to find a particular page a second time (although it's not specified whether or not the protagonist tried using bookmarks). The actual content of the book's text is unknown, as it's written in an unknown language; but there are simple illustrations every 2000 pages, which the protagonist quickly fills up a notebook recording. It is impossible to find the first page or the last, as new pages seem to spring up between the cover and the reader's finger whenever he tries. When the protagonist becomes obsessed with the book and determines to be rid of it, he considers burning it, but is afraid that the burning of an infinite book would itself be infinite and would cover the world in smoke, so he instead decides to hide a leaf in a forest by tucking the Book away deep within the National Library.
* [[Tom Holt]]'s ''May Contain Traces of Magic'' features a Book of Human Knowledge which is mass-produced by the sorcerous corporation J.W. Wells and co. However, the book only shows the viewer what he or she ''needs'' to know at the time, not what that person specifically wants to look up, unless you know the cheat codes.
* In James Stoddard's ''The High House'', the Book of Forgotten Things. Just everything you've ever forgotten.
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== Video Games ==
* In ''[[Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door]]'', one of Mario's partners has a book with information and pictures of every enemy in the game. This even includes {{spoiler|Princess Peach after being possessed by the final boss}}.
** However, it does not have infinite knowledge; this is demonstrated when Goombella [[
** It doesn't have {{spoiler|Doopliss's name}}.
** ''[[Super Paper Mario]]'' has the Dark Prognosticus, a book which has prophesied every event of the game. The villain, Count Bleck, has it, and often quotes directly from it, with the effect of [[Third Person Person|narrating his own life]].
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* In ''[[Valkyrie Profile]]'', Lezard Valeth states that he found the Philosopher's Stone (this version granting all knowledge), but that people have to work to get any knowledge out of it. He later clarifies by saying that a more accurate description of the Philosopher's "Stone" is the "[[Doorstopper|ten-billion page codex]]."
* In ''[[Blaze Union]]'', Nessiah's [[Spell Book]], [[Security Blanket|the Revelation of the Gods]], is reputed to be one of these. {{spoiler|Byff has technically been sent by his master to steal it.}} Its all-inclusiveness is justified by the fact that its owner {{spoiler|is over a thousand years old}}.
* ''[[Kingdom of Loathing]]'' has an appearance by the Tome Of Tropes, which is all but explicitly
* In ''[[Ultima]]'', the Codex Of Ultimate Wisdom. Unfortunately, ''reading'' it is a bit tricky (the entire fourth game is spent finding the darn thing; in the fifth game, it is stored on a faraway volcanic island with guardians that only let you pass if you're on a Sacred Quest; in the sixth game, it still is, and your final quest is to send it back to the void).
* The eponymous Elder Scrolls from ''[[The Elder Scrolls]]'' series. They exist partially outside of time and thus possess knowledge of things to come for those able to read them. They also possess various time related powers because of their unusual nature. They have a bit of [[Tome of Eldritch Lore]] flavor to them too, since ordinary mortals can't read them without suffering terrible consequences, the ''least'' of them being permanent blindness.
** To a lesser extent, Hermaes Mora's Ohgma Infinium. When a player reads it, they immediately gain 5 levels in all stats of a chosen path. But then the book dissolves [[Subverted Trope|before]] [[Go Mad from the Revelation|the player is overwhelmed]]. But then with a [[Good Bad Bug|prevalent bug]], players can avoid the disintegration and go all the way to max level within 15 minutes.
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== Web Original ==
* In [[Zero Punctuation]]'s review of [[Heavenly Sword]], when Yahtzee questions the meaning of the word "twing-twang", his avatar is briefly seen looking it up in a book titled "Words That Exist".
* The podcast ''[https://web.archive.org/web/20110520012255/http://www.flat29.com/podcast/index.html Flat 29's Big Book of Everything]'' purports to be this.
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* ''Dr. Ankowitschs Kleines Universal-Handbuch'', containing a large variety of practical and some of the rather bizarre points of information, from how to clean a feather boa to the break-down schematics of BMW Isetta 250-model's chassis. Sadly this book is apparently only available in Germany and Finland.
* The 44th edition of the ''CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics'' is another candidate and expanded far beyond what the title suggested, unlike later editions.
* Rutters were a combination of a downplayed version of this and [[Treasure Map]] (they were after all for the purpose of getting, well, treasure). They were a custom in Medieval times of Ship's Captains keeping almanacs including a series of charts usually with the harbors disproportionately enlarged (that is after all a place where you absolutely have to come closer to shore than needed to take landmarks). Other things include local navigational notes, commentary on customs and politics needed to get into the local market without [[Culture Clash]], and regular business contacts. Some rutters were secrets of a family or merchant house and passed down as an inheiritance. Toward the end of the Middle Ages some printers started publishing more generic rutters for anyone traversing a given route.
**There were overland versions of this. One famous one in American history is ''The Prairie Traveller'' which was a guidebook for migrants on the Oregon Trail.
* [[The Talmud]].
* Does the ''[[Oxford English Dictionary]]'' count?
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[[Category:Fictional Media]]
[[Category:Applied Phlebotinum]]
[[Category:Suspiciously Convenient Index]]
[[Category:Information Desk]]
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[[Category:Bookish Tropes]]
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