Our Blog

From a young age, I have dedicated my life to one creation– the homemade cookie. From the combination of my mother, a brilliant cook with zero interest in baking anything other than meat or dumplings (which makes her an even more amazing woman) and my dad’s addiction to chocolate chips and his extreme measures of not sharing them with his three beautiful children (read: put them on the highest shelf), the homemade cookie was rarely in our house. Frankly, store bought cookies don’t cut it for this cookie monster. In fact, cookies can’t even be in the same aisle as baking supplies, that’s how far they are from satisfying the real craving for cookies.

The first batch of homemade cookies I remember were by the hands of my older sister with help from me. She was finally tall enough to get the chair and reach over the refrigerator to grab my father’s stash of chocolate chips. The elusive treasure had a map on how to achieve twenty four delicious discs of butter, sugar, flour and chocolate. We carefully put them together to make the round glops spotted with chocolate. After their perfectly timed rest in the oven, we pulled out the hot cookie sheet of golden discs holding rich semi-sweet gooeyness. I found bliss.

Cookies will never go out of style. As long as the basic elements have come together, even the most hideous of cookies get eaten. So after flipping through the wonderful book, The Cookiepedia, I knew I found a kindred spirit in Stacy. She gets it. I made these animal cookies with a little frosting and some non-pareils sprinkled on that. The cinnamon will make people ask you what your secret ingredient is. It’s a great cookie for kids’ parties or adults who are trying to make up for the lost sweets from their childhood.

Recipe Notes: Don’t be alarmed if your cookies come out a little crispy. They will soften up if they sit out over night especially with frosting. Store these in an air tight container for about a week– if you can keep them in your house that long.

This Saturday, Quirk Books is participating in Word On The Street, a book festival going down in Toronto. It's an annual event chock full of great publishers and booksellers, author meet & greets, and of course, plenty of books to purchase. While we won't actually be there in person (I wish!), our books sure will.

At the festival, you'll be able to pick up copies of Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, Night of the Living Trekkies, the Meowmorphosis, Bedbugs and all three novels in the Pride & Prejudice & Zombies trilogy. You can spot us at Booth #201 & #202.

In addition to the publishers and authors showcasing their works and the epic marketplace of books, there are a number of fabulous events going on at the festival. A scavenger hunt, cooking demonstrations by some of Canada's top chefs, a cartooning workshop for kids, and our good friends at Random House CA are showcasing some new authors in their Remarkable Reads tent. And that's just to name a few! For the full list, visit their official website.

This bookish celebration runs from 11am to 6pm and is rain or shine. Cross your fingers for a sunny day!

Word On The Street
Sunday, September 25th, 11am to 6pm
www.thewordonthestreet.ca

There’s a reason that Collageorama’s Etsy shop proudly proclaims that it’s the “exclusive home of Dandy Cat and Friends!” Because seriously, look at that cat. Top hat, mustache, monocle… that is one awesome kitten to be proud of.

Collageorama’s shop dishes out exquisite prints of properly dressed animals, illustrated on repurposed dictionary pages. Here at Quirk, we love cute animals (Cuteoverload links are exchanged via email on a regular basis) and anything that has to do with books. And this shop has owls, frogs, giraffes, deer, mice, rabbits… all kinds of critters, all fantastically dressed and drawn out on recycled book pages?

Sold.

To help promote their highly anticipated follow up to 2009's Signing Their Lives Away, Denise Kiernan and Joseph D'Agnese whipped up this fabulous trailer for Signing Their Rights Away, which hit stores last Tuesday, September 6th.

Have a look, and be sure to share it with your American-history-loving friends!

Signing Their Rights Away [YouTube]

Every year on the 15th day of the 8th month of the Chinese calendar, on a date that parallels the autumnal equinox of the solar calendar, the Mid-Autumn Festival is celebrated. Families come together in China, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, the Philippines… all over the world. Food is shared under the Harvest Moon, a symbol of abundance and prosperity in many cultures.

To celebrate the abundance of food and good fortune, I whipped up a quick stir fry dish with the vegetables and beef strips I had on hand. One of the easiest dishes to put together, a good stir fry never fails to remind us that food is the one thing that unites the world, and will continue to do so, for many moons to come.

Bedbugs, the latest novel from Ben H. Winters (New York Times best-selling author of Sense & Sensibility & Sea Monsters), came out this past Tuesday… and well, it wouldn't be a Quirk fiction release without a proper book trailer, right?

That being said, I'd like to welcome you all to 56 Cranberry Street.

For this trailer, we worked with Epic Image Entertainment, the same folks behind the hilarious Meowmorphosis and Night of the Living Trekkies trailers. As always, we were thrilled with the results. Enjoy the trailer, and be sure to share it with all your friends.

Sleep tight.