The important elements of a reference include:

• Author(s)
• Year of Publication
• Title
• Publication details

For example, in the following citation for a book:

Rice, Earle 1996, The Battle of Midway, Lucent Books, San Diego, CA.

The author is: Rice, Earle

The title is: The Battle of Midway

The rest of the reference gives the publication details (date, publisher, place of publication).