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Cite in MLA Style: Works Cited: Books

General Format

Last name, First name. Title of Work. Publisher, year.

Notes:

  • A "container" in MLA Style is the item that holds the source you used. For example, an e-book is a source and the e-book database is the container. 
  • Date style is: Day Month Year, with the month abbreviated if it's five or more letters long. E.g., 5 Oct. 2024. 
  • If the resource has no author, then move the title element to the position of the author.

Books

Last name, First name, and First name Last name. Title of Work. Publisher, year.

Morrison, Toni. The Bluest Eye. Knopf, 1993.

Sánchez Prado, Ignacio M., editor. Mexican Literature in Theory. Bloomsbury, 2018.

Book Chapters or Short Stories

Last name, First name. “Title of Smaller Work.” Title of Container, edited by First name Last name, version, number, Publisher, year, page range, URL or DOI. Database Name.

Poe, Edgar Allan. "The Murders in the Rue Morgue." The Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poe, MysteriousPress.com, 2014, pages 99-130. ProQuest Ebook Central.

Poe, Edgar Allan. “Never Bet the Devil Your Head.” The Complete Stories. Knopf, 1992, pages 521-529. 

E-Books

Without a DOI or URL

Last name, First name and First name Last name. Title of Work. Title of Container, version, number, Publisher, year.

Bobel, Christopher, and Samantha Kwan. Body Battlegrounds: Transgressions, Tensions, and Transformations. Proquest Ebook Central, e-book ed., Vanderbilt University Press, 2019.

With a DOI or Stable URL

These are cited similarly to an ordinary web page, with the URL at the end.

Last name, First name and First name Last name. Title of Work. Title of Container, number, Publisher, year, www.someurl.com/full/address.

Austen, Jane. Pride and Prejudice. Project Gutenberg, 17 June 2024, www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/1342/pg1342-images.html.