Our Blog

[Photo from BlackHistoryMonth.gov]

This post contains affiliate links. When you buy through these links, Quirk Books may earn a commission.

Black History Month is back this February and with a little over two weeks left to celebrate, there’s no better time to revisit your TBR pile and slip in a few extra titles by Black authors. Better yet, bump them to the top of your TBR pile and dive right in.

Not sure which ones to start with? No worries! We’ve pulled select titles and paired them with readalikes to help you better judge which stories could be your cup of tea. And like we always say, whether you check the title out from your library or you purchase the book, e-book, or audiobook, every bit of support helps elevate Black creators and their individual stories, so keep on reading!

[Photo by Stephen Hardy from Pexels]

This post contains affiliate links. When you buy through these links, Quirk Books may earn a commission.

It’s the moment critters (Critical Role fans) have been waiting for for years. The season one premier of The Legend of Vox Machina is officially available on Amazon Prime, and old and new fans alike are pumped.

Not familiar with Critical Role or the new TV series? Here’s some quick details to catch you up:

• The Legend of Vox Machina is based on the beloved Critical Role YouTube show, a D&D livestream starring eight well-known voice actors you may recognize from video games, anime, and cartoons.

• The TV series started as a 20-min special kickstarter back in 2019 and earned over $11 million, making it the highest funded movie/TV kickstarter in history.

• The show is based on the first campaign of Critical Role and has already been greenlit for season two.

• The first Critical Role campaign has over 100 episodes, each averaging 4 hours, so the sheer amount of content may be daunting to some – that’s where the condensed TV series comes in.

• Interested? Check out the show's trailer, clips (here and here), live reading from the cast, the extended cast (oof, there's some big names here), or title sequence. Be warned this show is 18+.

According to the Critical Role site, episodes will be released in batches over the course of four weeks, which means you’ll have plenty of time to fall or fall back in love with Vox Machina. While you wait for new episodes, why not pick up another high fantasy series? Scroll down and see which book we recommend based on your favorite Vox Machina member.

[Photo by ramy Kabalan from Pexels]

Time to test your resilience, kiddos! I don’t know about you, but I’m already crumbling under my new year’s resolutions… Perhaps 2022 isn’t the year to turn over a new leaf. Instead of trying to shed those extra pounds, how about we focus on basic human survival?

According to UPenn professor and best-selling author Adam Grant, watching horror movies is a kind of exposure therapy, and people are unintentinally microdosing fear and anxiety in harmless situations to build up resistance to the real thing. Here’s a handy-dandy list of movies available at horror-streaming behemoth Shudder, nicely paired with their literary counterpart, to help get you through this never-ending hellscape that is 2022.

This post contains affiliate links. When you buy through these links, Quirk Books may earn a commission.

Today marks the eighty-first birthday of the beloved Hayao Miyazaki, and we’re here to celebrate his critically-acclaimed films. Known mainly for his work with Studio Ghibli, the animation studio he co-founded with fellow director/screenwriter/producer Isao Takahata and producer Toshio Suzuki, Miyazaki’s made a huge impact on the international animation community and animation fans alike.

His original film Spirited Away is currently the eighth highest-grossing animated film of all time, five of his films place in the top ten highest-grossing anime films, and he’s won countless global awards and nominations for (including, but in no way limited to) the Tokyo Anime Awards, The Mainichi Film Awards, the US and Japan Academy Awards, the Annie Awards, Kinema Junpo Awards, and the Golden Bear Award. He’s also a Person of Cultural Merit, an official and high honor for those who’ve contributed to the creative advancement of Japanese culture.

Whether you’ve watched all his films, starting with Lupin III: The Castle of Cagliostro, or you have that one comfort Miyazaki film that you turn to in times of need, the themes of humanity and nature, friendship and family, and all sorts of human emotions are sure to stick with you.

Many viewers still have that itch that only Miyazaki films can scratch, and while you wait for Miyazaki’s last film, based on Yoshino Genzaburo’s novel How Do You Live?, try these middle grade and young adult books based on your favorite Miyazaki film.

Photo by Markus Spiske from Pexels

Love them or hate them, there’s no denying that revivals and reboots are a big part of Hollywood right now. From Ghostbusters to Home Alone to Child’s Play to this month’s highly anticipated release of The Matrix Resurrections (over 20 years since the first film was released), everyone loves seeing older franchises updated and brought back to the big screen.

Inevitably, moviegoers can expect more classic franchises to get refreshers, and while remakes are definitely an option, it seems that fans are far more interested to see continuations of the original story. Of course, not every ’90s franchise deserves a follow up and some have already had failed attempts, but these five would have the subject matter, big names, or devoted fanbase to pull off a resurrection of their own.

Photo by cottonbro from Pexels

The King’s Man hits cinemas this month, continuing the story of the Kingsman with a prequel – and instead of focusing on Eggsy, the underdog of the first film, it will look at how the spy organization fared in World War 1.

While the details of the plot will have to wait until it hits the big screen, fans of the series know that they can count on director Matthew Vaughn’s incredible approach, which means brilliant action, bold shots, and a lot of comedy to balance it out. This, and the original Kingsman, makes a change from the classic spy movie style, but it’s the time period that really makes this stand out. While there are many critically acclaimed spy flicks set in the modern day (or the era they were released in), giving things a period flair creates something truly special—as these other phenomenal historical spy and action movies do too.