Happy Ghibli Fest! Read This Graphic Novel If You Love This Studio Ghibli Movie

If you’re like me and love the beautiful coastal backdrop of the Studio Ghibli film Ponyo, as well as themes of family, first loves, and mermaids, I think you’ll fall in love with this delightful graphic novel by Lee Knox Ostertag. While a teen named Morgan wants to escape her stifling life on the island where she lives, things take a turn when she gets rescued from drowning by a girl named Keltie. As the two discover budding feelings for each other, both will have to come to terms with their own buried secrets.

The magic of My Neighbor Totoro lies in the dreamy yet melancholic tone of the film, as well as the mysterious and cute creature named Totoro, who brings joy back into the characters’ lives. Just as siblings Satsuki and Mei navigate their feelings of grief and worry over their mother’s health, the characters in this story collection by Little Thunder also grapple with feelings of sadness and a search for belonging. The collection contains three stories, following different characters who make connections with a curious creature named Kylooe. While a lonely girl makes a friend in a surreal dream world in one story, another story chronicles the bumpy relationship between a popular teen and a troubled loner, and the third takes place in a dystopian world where emotions must be suppressed.

Hayao Miyazaki’s son, Goro Miyazaki, made his feature directorial debut with Tales from Earthsea. As the film has reached its 20th anniversary this year, it has also been selected for Ghibli Fest for the first time. For those watching Tales From Earthsea, this graphic novel adaptation of Ursula K. Le Guin’s classic fantasy by Fred Fordham makes for the perfect pairing. After a smith’s son named Ged discovers he can work magic, he heads off to wizard school. While there, he’ll find himself summoning a shadow creature he can’t seem to get rid of.

Isao Takahata, co-founder of Studio Ghibli, directed the poignant film Only Yesterday, which reached its 35th anniversary this year. This moving manhwa by Hyeon A. Cho promises a similar feel to Only Yesterday. Just as Taeko reflects on many memories from when she was a young student, this story involves a middle school girl named Sori who also tries to remember people she’s interacted with from her past as she follows clues left behind by a mysterious letter writer and befriends a boy from her school along the way. The story also touches upon the beauty of nature as Sori treks through the woods surrounding her school campus, looking for letters and helping with the school greenhouse. Like Only Yesterday, this touching tale will take root in your heart and stick there.

Castle in the Sky, Hayao Miyazaki’s first film created with Studio Ghibli, celebrates its 40th anniversary this year. Like the mysterious robots of Castle in the Sky, this classic manga series by Hiromu Arakawa features a similar character in the form of a soul residing within a suit of armor. After something goes wrong in an alchemical ritual, Edward Elric loses two limbs while his brother Alphonse becomes the soul in the armor. The story also blurs the lines between magic and science and features a hunt-style quest for a lost artifact reminiscent of the various characters seeking out the fabled city of Laputa in Castle in the Sky.

Demons play a major role in the Studio Ghibli film Princess Mononoke as well as in this historical fantasy manga by Koyoharu Gotouge. In Mononoke, Prince Ashitaka slays a demon attacking his village and becomes infected by it. Just as Tanjiro’s sister gets transformed into a demon in this manga series, so too will Asitaka if he doesn’t find a cure for his wound. San, the girl raised by the wolf gods in Mononoke, must also face demons as the boar god Nago becomes corrupted by one and begins wreaking havoc in her sacred forest. In the manga, Tanjiro hunts for a way to return his sister back to her former self and slay the demon that killed the rest of his family.

The Academy Award-winning film Spirited Away celebrates its 25th anniversary this year, and it makes for the perfect finale for Studio Ghibli Fest. One of my favorite aspects of the masterpiece that is Spirited Away is Chihiro’s seamless merging from the human world into the spirit world. The scene where she follows her parents through the empty train station to the eerily abandoned park always gives me chills. This manga by Mai Mochizuki offers a retelling of Alice in Wonderland, which shares many themes with Spirited Away as Alice falls into a fantastical world full of wondrous, strange, and at times, dangerous characters. In this manga, an orphan named Alice escapes her difficult life with her abusive uncle and heads to Kyoto. However, she finds herself arriving in quite a different version of Kyoto than she remembers from long ago.