Enchanted Book

An enchanted book is an item which allows players to add enchantments to weapons, tools, or armor by combining the enchantment book with one of said items on an anvil. Enchanted Books look like a book with a red ribbon around it. The player can create an enchanted book by enchanting a book on an enchantment table, which will yield a single enchantment. Enchanted books are single-use. Enchanted books can also be found in chests located in dungeons, strongholds, desert temples, jungle temples, mineshafts and villages. The third way Enchanted Books can also be obtained is by trading with librarian villagers. In Survival, enchanted books are the only method to obtain certain enchantments, such as Silk Touch on shears, or Unbreaking on a sword. Enchanted books glow like other enchanted objects.

Use
To use an enchanted book, the player must place an item in the first slot in an anvil, and a book in the next. In order to complete the enchantment, the player must have the required amount of experience.

In Creative mode, the player can enchant any block or item with any enchantment. As a result, a dirt block with Sharpness will do more damage, and a dirt block with Silk Touch can dig up grass blocks. In Creative, the books can be found in their appropriate tabs. (e.g Silk Touch in the Tools tab, Fire Aspect in the Weapons tab etc.)

Furthermore, enchanted books themselves can be combined to create a single book with increased or multiple enchantments. If the enchantment is different on each book (e.g., Fire Aspect and Smite) the enchantments will stack. If the enchantment is the same (e.g., Smite on both books) the enchantments will only add if both books are at the same level. For example, attempting to combine a Smite II book with a Smite I book will yield a Smite II book. Adding two enchantments at the same level gives the next level up (so Smite II + Smite II = Smite III, not Smite IV). Enchanted books can only be combined in Creative mode.

In Survival mode, enchanted books can be used with limited set of items.

Enchanted books do not exhibit their enchantment (e.g. attacking with enchanted book with Sharpness will not do more damage).

Effective combinations
Using Enchanted Books, it is possible to apply certain effects to tools that would not gain them at an Enchantment Table. Besides enchantments normally received on an Enchantment table, the following combinations are possible:

Bugs
One notable bug is that when a player logs out of an SMP server with an Enchanted Book in their inventory, the book loses its enchantment name and becomes a useless "Enchanted Book" on re-entering the server.

Trivia

 * Combining a regular book with an enchantment on an anvil in Creative will yield an enchanted regular book, not an enchanted book. However, combining two enchanted books will stack their effects into a new enchanted book (however, this is typically more expensive than simply enchanting the item twice).
 * Enchanted books found in dungeons can contain any enchantment available to players, including those normally only obtainable on books via the anvil - rank 5 of Sharpness, Bane of Arthropods, Smite, Power and Efficiency.
 * Enchanted books can put enchantments previously impossible to get on a few other items, but enchantments will only work on tools, armor, and weapons, and some enchantments are item-specific. Enchantment restrictions are lifted in Creative mode, and unusually-enchanted items created this way remain useful in Survival mode.
 * Enchanted Books do not use the reddish book texture from the Book and Quill and Written Books.
 * There is an "Awesome" V enchantment obtainable via enchanted books.