Here is the Selected List of Subject Encyclopedias in the HSU Library to give you an idea of what is available. Change all of these to any of these . Click the Search button. Books cover a subject in depth and detail. There may be only one viewpoint, or there may be several, as in a compilation of essays or conference papers.
Books offer the broadest scope for discussing a subject.
They also take a relatively long time to write and produce. So, although they bring together large amounts of material, they are not necessarily the most current information on a subject. This is more of a problem for some topics than others. You may not need to read an entire book to get the information you need from it. Look at its table of contents or index, if there is one, to see where your specific interest is addressed.