Henry's Once Upon a Time Book

"They're not fairy tales... Every story in this book actually happened."

- Henry to his birth mother

The Once Upon a Time Book, commonly referred to as Henry's Book or simply The Book, is an item featured on ABC's Once Upon a Time. It first appears in the first episode of the first season.

Trivia

 * -|On-screen Notes=

On-screen Notes

 * Throughout the series, excerpts from several fairytales and stories are in the book, including The Golden Bird; The Wonderful Wizard of Oz; Alice's Adventures in Wonderland; and Snow-White and Rose-Red.
 * The picture of Dorothy and the Flying Monkeys is "The Monkeys Caught Dorothy in Their Arms and Flew Away With Her", one of W. W. Denslow's illustrations from the first edition of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.
 * The illustration of Alice and the Caterpillar is a colorized version of one of John Tenniel's illustrations from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.
 * There are other stories that do not exist in the book such as Frankenstein due to unknown reasons. Henry theorized that Dr. Frankenstein's story is not in the book since he does not originate from the Enchanted Forest as the other people in the book do. However, on numerous occasions, images in other realms have been featured such as the Caterpillar as well as Jefferson in Wonderland.
 * Some of the images are illustrations by the famous English book illustrator Arthur Rackham:
 * An illustration from Little Brother & Little Sister and Other Tales By The Brothers Grimm (1917), which depicts a scene from the Grimm fairy tale "Maid Maleen".
 * "He Played Until The Room Was Entirely Filled With Gnomes", published during the late nineteenth century. This image depicts a scene from the Grimm fairy tale "The Gnome".
 * "The Meeting of Oberon and Titania" (1905), from William Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream.
 * A 1909 illustration from the fairy tale of "Little Red Riding Hood".
 * "What Did She Find There But Real Ripe Strawberries", also from Little Brother & Little Sister and Other Tales By The Brothers Grimm. This image depicts a scene from the fairy tale of "The Three Little Men in the Wood".
 * "When He Heard Peter's Voice He Popped in Alarm Behind a Tulip, from J.M. Barrie's book Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens (1906).
 * An illustration from Nathaniel Hawthorne's children's book A Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys (1851). It depicts a scene from the story "The Paradise of Children".
 * "Fairies Away! We Shall Chide Downright, If I Longer Stay" (1908). It depicts Titania in a scene from A Midsummer Night's Dream.
 * "Preposterous Cried Solomon in a Rage", also from Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens.


 * -|Production Notes=

Production Notes

 * When creating the book, the prop department brought in every style and type of book they could find, and picked out an antique accounting book. They aged it up a little, and the art department would press stamps into the cover of the book to change the cover. A book builder made replicas of the finished product. The prop department created many pages with text on them, and added several illustrations.
 * The show does several transitions from the book to live action. If they're lucky, the prop department creates an illustration out of a screen-grab and inserts it into the book. If the prop department's schedule takes before the filming of the main action of the story line, they put a green page in the book, and the visual effects department will make their own illustration.
 * -|Props Notes=

Props Notes

 * A blank prop replica of the book was signed by Edward Kitsis, Adam Horowitz, Ginnifer Goodwin, Lana Parrilla, Josh Dallas, Emilie de Ravin, Robert Carlyle, Michael Raymond-James and Colin O'Donoghue for a September 2013 Stand Up 2 Cancer charity event.
 * -|Other Notes=

Goofs

 * When Henry is given the storybook in October 2011, he sees a picture of the scene with Geppetto, Jiminy Cricket and Pinocchio right before the Blue Fairy's arrival. However, the story of Pinocchio being sent to the Land Without Magic along with Emma was not in the book until August added it several months later.

Appearances
Note: "Archive" denotes archive footage.