Concealing objects in a book

A hollowed out book, with bottle caps for scale.

There are many real and fictitious occurrences of concealing something in a book. Items can be concealed in books in a number of ways. Small items such as a photograph or a note can be hidden in between the pages of the book. Thicker items can be hidden by removing the interior portion of some or all of the pages, creating a book safe or hollowed-out book. Book safes are easy for its owner to recognise, but they do not stand out to a thief or other intruder.

Another type of concealment is the hiding of messages in the text or on a book's pages by printing in code – a form of steganography. For example, letters could be underlined on sequential pages, with the letters spelling out a message or code. There are a number of actual and fictional examples of items or messages have being concealed in a book.

Illicit chemicals may be smuggled by soaking individual pages with them.

Books are used as a concealment device in part because they are readily available and inconspicuous in many settings.

Methods of concealment

Book safes

Book safes provide cheap and easily accessible method of hiding small valuables or contraband. Some retailers sell hollowed-out books for valuables, as a way of concealing these items from a burglar. These hollowed-out books can also be used to hide illegal or contraband items. The most elaborate examples features a compartment requiring a key or combination within, offering an additional layer of security. Sometimes these items are real books that have been cut, but they may instead be made from other materials, such as plastic or metal.

Many book safes are home-made, and are created by brushing a combination of white paper glue and water over a book's edges. This process seals the pages into a solid block. The inside is then cut out using a sharp knife, dremel or razor blade. Book safes are often lined inside with felt or another soft material, to muffle the sound of objects moving inside the book.

Steganography and hidden messages

Messages can be hidden within a book using steganographic techniques. Invisible ink may be used to write words and sentences in the book, or by underlining certain words or letters a message can be crafted.

The author of a book may write codes by carefully chosing the wording. There have been many claims of a bible code in which hidden messages can be found by manipulating the text. The 1997 book The Bible Code by Michael Drosnin is one of the most famous examples. On the other hand, it has been claimed that you can find "hidden messages" in any book using this method.

File:BibleCode.png

Arrange the letters from Genesis 26:5–10 in a 33 column grid and you get a word search with "Bible" and "code". Other arrangements can yield many other words.

Choice of book

In fictional uses of book safes, the title or subject of the book can be symbolic or related to the nature of the object, e.g. hidden money in a copy of The Wealth of Nations. There are a number of cases from films and television series where an item is hidden in the Bible.

Actual or purported examples

Objects

• Hollowed-out books have been used to smuggle items into prisons, such as tools to aid a prison escape or contraband or illegal items such as drugs or weapons.
• Small bombs can be hidden inside books, with a trigger that operates when book is opened. In 1980, United Airlines president Percy Wood was injured by the explosion of a pipe bomb hidden inside a book that he received in the mail.
• A man in Redding, California was arrested after taking photographs of a young girl with a camera hidden inside a book.
• In 2005, antiques thieves attempted to use a hollowed-out book to take a precious lead weight out of Israel.
• Guards at the Washington County Jail in Fayetteville, Arkansas seized a book that had been marked with what appeared to be stains from a leaking yellow felt pen, but tested positive for methamphetamine

Fictional occurrences

Television

• In the series Prison Break, the main character, Michael Scofield, hides a screw in a Bible, which he uses to break out of prison.
• In the 2005 episode of the television series Lost "What Kate Did" one of the characters finds some film in a Bible.
• An episode of The Simpsons features a bible hollowed out to hold alcohol.
• In an episode of House, the title character conceals a bottle of Vicodin in a textbook on lupus.

Film

• Red Grant, one of the villains in the 1963 James Bond film From Russia with Love has a gun hidden in a copy of War and Peace.
• A nail trimmer is concealed in a Bible by inmate Frank Morris in the 1979 film "Escape from Alcatraz".
• In the 1993 Disney film The Three Musketeers, Aramis pulls a pistol from a hollowed out bible to save d'Artagnan from the executioners' axe.
• The 1994 film The Shawshank Redemption sees one of the characters hide a rock hammer inside a Bible. The first page to be cut into bears the title "Exodus". The line "Salvation lies within" is also repeated more than once.
• In the 1997 Disney film Jungle 2 Jungle, an item is hidden in the Bible.
• In the 1997 film The Game, Michael Douglas takes out a gun from a hollowed-out To Kill a Mockingbird book.
• Lara Croft finds a hidden note from her father bound behind a book jacket in the movie Lara Croft: Tomb Raider.
• In the 1999 film The Matrix, a central character Neo hides several computer disks in a copy of Jean Baudrillard's Simulacra and Simulation.
• In the 1999 short film Me and the Big Guy, Citizen 43275-B hides a diary, pen, and pair of glasses in a Re-Education Manual.
• In the 2004 film Harold and Kumar go to White Castle, Kumar hides his stash of marijuana in his medical book.
• In the 2006 film V for Vendetta, Bishop Anthony James Lilliman hides a gun in a copy of the Bible.
• In the 2007 film The Invisible, the protagonist hides money he has earned selling essays in a hollowed-out copy of Catch 22.

Fiction writing

• Explorers on the Moon, one of The Adventures of Tintin, features a book hollowed out to hold alcohol.
• In Robert Ludlum's posthumously published book The Janson Directive, Paul Janson's old mentor Angus Fielding don of Trinity College pulls a .22 Webley Pistol out of the 1759 edition of Samuel Johnson's A Dictionary of the English Language A-G (the A standing for ammunition and the G for guns).
• In the novel Interstellar Pig, Barney hides the Piggy in a hollowed-out high-school yearbook.

Games

• In the 2001 adventure game Alfred Hitchcock Presents The Final Cut the player must cut open a book with a knife to discover a key. [1].
• In the horror game Resident Evil, players can obtain a book with a medal hidden inside.
• In the video game Hitman: Blood Money, the player can conceal a bomb in a hollow bible.
• In the Nintendo DS game Another Code, a key is found inside a hollow book.
• In the Computer and NES game Shadowgate, a key is found in a hollowed out book. The player must learn to open the book without removing it, because by moving the book, a switch is set off that drops the player into a pit.

Related concepts

• Often in popular fiction, a switch to open a secret passage is disguised as a book on a bookshelf.

External links

• "Kosovo journalist gunned down" at BBC News, 11 September 2000, showing a picture of a gun hidden inside a book
• How To Make a Secret Hollow Book",