Skip to Main Content

Cite in Chicago Style NB (18th edition): References: Books

General Format

References are entered in two places. The Bibliography goes at the end of your paper, and the Notes are the in-text citation in the body of your paper.

The Bibliography has the full citation information

  • Single-spaced and with no extra space between entries.
  • Alphabetize entries and use a hanging indent.
  • See the examples in the boxes below.

Notes are either endnotes (at the end of the body of paper) or footnotes (bottom of each page)

  • Use either footnotes or endnotes, not both. The content and format is the same, the only change is where the note goes in your document. 
  • Numbered notes are coordinated with superscript numbers in the body of the text.
  • Notes are indented by one tab.
  • The first time you cite a source, use the Full Note as indicated below; subsequent times, use the Shortened Note form.

Books

Last name, First name. Title. Publisher, date.

Arendt, Hannah. Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil. Viking Press, 1963.

For books with editors, translators, or other contributors, see examples in the Chicago manual, chapter 14.6 and 14.7.

Full note:

1. Hannah Arendt, Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil (Viking Press, 1963), 24.

Shortened note:

2. Arendt, Eichmann in Jerusalem, 26.

Book Chapters

Last name, First name. "Title of Chapter." In Title of Book, edited by First name Last name. Publisher, date.

Hempton, David. "The People Called Methodists: Transitions in Britain and North America." In Oxford Handbook of Methodist Studies, edited by James E. Kirby and William J. Abraham. Oxford University Press, 2009.

 

Full note:

3. David Hempton, "The People Called Methodists: Transitions in Britain and North America," in Oxford Handbook of Methodist Studies, ed. James E. Kirby and William J. Abraham (Oxford University Press, 2009), 72.

Shortened note:

4. Hempton, "People Called Methodists," 75. 

Unpublished Manuscripts

In archives or other collections

In the note, include the details of the specific item cited. In the bibliography, include the details for the whole collection.

Horton Foote papers, DeGolyer Library, Southern Methodist University.

Kallen, Horace. Papers. YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, New York.

 

Full note:

5. Alvin Johnson, memorandum, 1937, file 36, Horace Kallen Papers, YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, New York.

Shortened note: 

6. Johnson, memorandum.

Not publicly available

Unpublished documents that are not available to other readers should be only mentioned in the text or a note but not included in the bibliography. For example:

In an unpublished manuscript7 shared with the author, . . .

7. Jess Smith, “Analyzing the Unknowable,” unpublished manuscript, May 5, 2024.

E-Books

Available via the internet

Last name, First name. Title. Publisher, date. DOI or stable link if available.

Kurland, Philip B., and Ralph Lerner, eds. The Founders’ Constitution. University of Chicago Press, 1987. http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/.

 

Full note:

8. Philip B. Kurland and Ralph Lerner, eds., The Founders’ Constitution (University of Chicago Press, 1987), chap. 10, doc. 19, http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/.

Shortened note: 

9. Kurland and Lerner, Founders’ Constitution, chap. 4, doc. 29.

Available via specific platform or reader

Last name, First name. Title. Publisher, date. Name of platform.

Do not use the long, often-unstable link provided by many database platforms. 

Bobel, Chris and Samantha Kwan. Body Battlegrounds: Transgressions, Tensions, and Transformations. Vanderbilt University Press, 2019. Proquest Ebook Central.

Obama, Michelle. Becoming. Crown, 2018. Kindle.

 

Full note:

10. Chris Bobel and Samantha Kwan, Body Battlegrounds (Vanderbilt University Press, 2019), 118, Proquest Ebook Central.

11. Michelle Obama, Becoming (Crown, 2018), 49, Kindle.

Shortened note: 

12. Bobel and Kwan, Body Battlegrounds, 118.

13. Obama, Becoming, 112.