pages number doesn't appear in the reference with using @book and .bib [duplicate]

Are you sure you need the pages to be printed? It's not very common that the pages of a whole book are used in bibliographies, since they don't serve much purpose.

\bibliography<> only takes a single argument as far as I know. Also, I don't know if it matters, but \bibliographystyle usually comes first. But @AlanMunn is right: entries for books don't usually include page numbers or the total number of pages.

@croco None of the major style guides (MLA, APA, Chicago) require pages for books, and I doubt if there are any journals in the natural sciences that require them either. I've only seen them used in very specialized contexts, e.g. the bibliography item that accompanies a review of book in a journal.

@CroCo You cite from a bibliographic item, which in this case is a book. The bibliography is meant for making the reader able to retrieve the item. If you cite a particular page from a book, then the page number should be shown at the citation, not in the bibliography.

@egreg That depends on the subject area: in chemistry it is common to give a reference to a book page or pages, and rather less common to reference a book as a whole.

2 Answers 2

This is by design. If we take a look at plain.bst (the \bibliographystyle you're using), and find the section for FUNCTION :

FUNCTION  < output.bibitem author empty$ < format.editors "author and editor" output.check > < format.authors output.nonnull crossref missing$ < "author and editor" editor either.or.check >'skip$ if$ > if$ new.block format.btitle "title" output.check crossref missing$ < format.bvolume output new.block format.number.series output new.sentence publisher "publisher" output.check address output > < new.block format.book.crossref output.nonnull >if$ format.edition output format.date "year" output.check new.block note output fin.entry > 

There is no mention of pages anywhere in this function. Other entry types that use pages (such as article , inproceedings , etc.) all have some line similar to format.pages output which outputs the page number(s).

The pages parameter is still allowed and valid because, while the plain style doesn't use it, other styles can and do use it. So a given .bib file is usable with many different output styles.