Ages ago, when Vanus Galerian was still a student on the Isle of Arteum, he found the notes of Asliel Direnni which had been passed down through the generations. After leaving to found the Mage's Guild, he worked with two master alchemists to finish and publish these notes. The set contains 9 books, organized by type of ingredient, and a reference book of the most powerful ingredients for each effect. One of the alchemists, Gildor Inglorian, hated that Galerian refused to include the ingredients from men, mer, and beastfolk, so he created his own volume that included these. These books are pretty rare (mages aren't known for being careful with their research materials), but at least one copy of each can be found in Skyrim, and the more common books can be found in multiple places and occasionally in an alchemy shop. Other alchemists are looking for these books too, so some in the wild might have clues for where to search.
This mod adds a set of 11 books to the game that teach the effects of the different ingredients with options for vanilla Skyrim and CACO. Each book focuses on ingredients from a different type of source (plants, animals, etc) except for the reference book that contains lists of the most potent ingredients for each potion effect. These books will also teach the effects of ingredients from some other mods- BOT, Immersive Creatures, SkyBirds, Hunterborn, and Heart Breaker provided they are active in the load order. There is no hard dependency, this just requires that the .esp can be detected by my mod. Both the CACO version and the vanilla version have this feature. I suggest using CACO because it is an excellent mod that improves alchemy a lot and because this mod was originally designed with CACO in mind. In the vanilla version each book has way fewer ingredients simply because CACO adds so many. The books are:

• Of the Dirt (Bugs)
• Of Flora I- Flowers, Fruits, and Nuts
• Of Flora II- Leaves, Roots, and Mushrooms
• Of the Waters
• Of the Skies
• Of the Beasts
• Of the Children of Auri-El and Y'ffre (giants, spriggans, etc)
• Of the Unnatural and Otherworldly
• Of Minerals and Gems (pearls, salts, oils)
• Reference: Potent Ingredients
• Of Black Alchemy
  

The first three are common books- they are available through alchemy shops and have multiple definite locations. The next three are less common, but are still occasionally found at shops and and in a couple of locations. The next four are rare- they are found in only one location each, but, if you're lucky, you might find a copy at the Arcaneum. There is only one copy of the last one. Some alchemists that are in the wild (ie not shopowners) have clues to help you find the more rare books.


Just install one of the four main versions. There is a scripted and unscripted version for both CACO and vanilla. The scripted versions teach the effects of ingredients, while the unscripted versions are only reference books. Both of the scripted versions require SKSE. The CACO version requires- you guessed it- CACO. Other than that there are no requirements. All versions contain the ingredients from all supported mods in the text The scripted versions will teach the effects of the ingredients added in supported mods provided their .esp is active in your load order, but these .esps are not required for the mod to work.



Credits-
ruritania from dafont.com
lots of brushes from Leichman and Lileya at Deviantart.com
Leather base from Tony Thomas at https://medialoot.com/item/distressed-leather-textures/
Better Book Meshes - https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/37113?tab=description