1989-2003 Editions
The book begins with a pull-out insert, with one side being a replica of a fictional Mother's Day newspaper, complete with articles detailing the events in the game prior to Ninten's journey, with the other side of the inset showing a full-scale map of the world of Mother in the style of a road-trip map. The book then begins with an introduction, which fleshes out George and Maria's first meeting and marriage, George investigating strange occurrences in Mother's Day and the couple's subsequent disappearance, and George's mysterious return two years later by himself and his strange study of psychic powers. It also details Ninten's courageous vow to protect his family and investigate the strange phenomena that has returned to the quaint town eight decades after it had first occurred. Along with the introduction, the English lyrics for Pollyanna are provided above the second page of the introduction. The book then shows character bios for each of the four main protagonists, expanding their backstories and providing a photo gallery of their favorite things in each of their respective bios. After that, the book shows nine other important characters, including Ninten's Mom, Mimmie and Minnie, Ninten's father, Pippi, Queen Mary, the Flying Men, Mick, and Eve.
The book's first chapter then starts out with an overview of Ninten's home and the town of Mother's Day, detailing maps, tricks, and information associated with each location whilst acting as a mock travel brochure. Canary Village, the South Cemetery, Choucream Zoo, Magicant, its Underground, Thanksgiving, Sweet Little Factory, Duncan's Factory, and the Santa Claus Station are also expounded upon in the same fashion, with each location having maps, real-life photographs of people, vehicles, objects, and papier-mâché models along with in-game screenshots and interviews with people involved with the game. Comic strips based off of the game are sprinkled throughout the chapter and the following one as well. There are reviews by several people located throughout this chapter and in the next, detailing what they liked and didn't like about the game, ultimately showing their appreciation for Itoi and the development crew for creating the game. There are also several Artist Profiles throughout the book, detailing the individual artists for the book and their work and contributions for it. This chapter and the following one also end with an overall summary of the chapter and a checklist of the major events covered in the respective chapter.
The second chapter begins with a fictional guide to the departure times of the Santa Claus Station's express train before the next two pages provide the English lyrics for Jeb Milne/Jeb Million's The Paradise Line against a photograph of a loading train passing by a mesa. The book then covers Reindeer, Halloween, Snowman, Advent Desert, Ruins of Desert, Easter, Swamp Land, Valentine, Cave of Holy Loly, and Holy Loly Mountain, which all have the same layout as the locations in the previous chapter. The following two pages are dedicated to an english lyric set for the Eight Melodies song with an alternate lyric set nearby, overlaid against a photograph of a car driving near a mesa with billowing white clouds swirling over it, before ending with an overall summary and checklist for the chapter.
The third chapter consists of a Goods Catalog, which details every purchasable item (e.g. the Wooden bat) and non-purchasable item (e.g. Great-Grand Father's Diary) in the game, which are each represented by either real-life models or objects. It also details a list of every vehicle you can ride in the game from the Santa Claus express train all the way to the boat you use to access the underwater lab where Eve is located, with each being represented by papier-mâché models. The next page then details the most efficient way to maximize your weapon and item usage as you gain more powerful weapons throughout the game. After that is a list of every PSI move you can use against your foes, with a section on how you can use your PSI powers in battle and when you are not in battle. The chapter then ends with an interview with Shigeru Miyamoto.
The fourth chapter consists entirely of people's reviews of Mother, with one of them, Kouji Imura, being one of Japan's foremost figures in the field of parapsychology research and PSI power development. There are also interviews with the composers of the game, Keiichi Suzuki and Hirokazu Tanaka, detailing the process behind the composing as well as discussing the Mother soundtrack album. Additionally, there is a "making-of" section for the live-action Japanese Mother commercial [1], as well as an interview with Shigesato Itoi about the inspirations behind Mother and the process of bringing the project to life while also bringing an emotional quality to it. [2] The chapter then ends with a Japanese translation of the english newspaper inset from the beginning of the book.
The fifth and final chapter of the book begins with a two-page section detailing how to fight enemies, using various difficult enemies from towards the end of the game as examples of how to fight them, such as the dragon located in the Magicant Underground. The right side of the right page details some enemies (like the Starman) and their respective stats, as well as short descriptions about their respective strengths and weaknesses as well as any other unique attributes and abilities that each enemy may have. The following section of the book is the final one: it is a complete list of every enemy in the game (except Giygas), showing their stats and their descriptions (unique for each foe), along with their respective papier-mâché model; and when there is no model to represent the enemy, the in-game sprite is instead used to represent that enemy. The section ends with an artist profile before the book finally closes with a list of credits for the producers and staff for the book and its publishing company.
2003 Edition
The contents for the 2003 rerelease are exactly the same as the original version, the only difference being an entirely new section at the beginning to celebrate the release of the then-newly-released Mother 1+2. The section begins after the newspaper/road-trip map insert and consists of an introduction by Shigesato Itoi where he gives his gratitude and appreciation to the crew who worked on the original game, the original encyclopedia, and the readers of both versions; a timeline of every Mother game and every Mother novel/book released up to that point; and a Mother 1+2 advertisement featuring Mr. Saturn and his unique form of speech. The end of the book is also different, listing the staff credits for not only the crew who worked on the 1989 version but also the 2003 edition and their respective companies.