A Reader's Guide to the Official Legend of Zelda Books and Manga Series
The Legend of Zelda may be one of Nintendo’s most storied and popular video game franchises, but did you also know there’s a vast library of books you can check out? From a wide variety of manga to lore encyclopedias, these books make the perfect gift for the Zelda fanatic in your life during the holiday season. Or if you just wanted to spruce up your own bookshelf, we got you covered there too.
We’ve organized all of the official Legend of Zelda books into three core sections below. There’s the manga, encyclopedias, and the guide books that go welle beyond the Zelda games you know and love.
Penned by Akira Himekawa, the Legend of Zelda manga span almost the entire history of the games, with major manga series based on many of the mainline titles like Ocarina of Time and the Minish Cap. These are great for people new to manga wanting to dip their toes in, or die-hard fans of the games looking for deeper world building. All of these stories are available individually, but if you’re a collector, you can get some of them in various collected box sets, like the Legendary Edition chest.
The 11 volume Twilight Princess Manga has its own boxed set, which includes the complete story and a poster. Additionally, the Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past manga by Shotaro Ishinomori is a great quick read that’s also available.
If you’re in the mood for something a little more educational, the Legend of Zelda encyclopedias are the perfect place to get a deep dive into Hyrule’s lore, culture, and different races. The Legend of Zelda: Hyrule Historia originally released in 2013 and gave fans the first officially established timeline. If you’re unfamiliar, for years fans have meticulously speculated about a branching timeline that began in Ocarina of Time — one branch where adult Link defeats Ganondorf and one where he doesn’t. It’s a pretty interesting bit of lore that explains some of the settings in later and past games.
The Legend of Zelda Encyclopedia and Art & Artifacts offer even deeper looks at the universe, and include detailed breakdowns of the different items, characters, and enemies, as well as exclusive interviews with developers. There’s even a deluxe editon of the encyclopedia that looks like a retro NES cartridge, which I’d definitely recommend checking out for a bit more.
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild – Creating a Champion is an over 400 page companion to the 2017 game. It contains countless design artwork and concept art, a look at the history of Hyrule, and interviewers with key developers.
Thanks in part to the internet, they just don’t quite make video game strategy guides like they used to. These days, older guides from publishers like Prima Games and Brady Games have become steeply priced collector’s items. There is, however, one massive hardcover official guide for 2023’s Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom that is currently available on the Nintendo Switch. This almost 500 page guide covers everything you need to know in the game, from every Korok location and cooking recipes, to dungeon solutions and boss fight strategies.
Of course, you can also find all of that information in IGN’s guide to the game, but this physical copy is a great addition to your shelf.
Unfortunately, there isn’t any sort of official Legend of Zelda cookbook out there. Which is a real shame with how delicious some of the recipes in Tears of Kingdom look. The good news is that there is an unofficial Zelda cookbook with over 50 recipes inspred by Hyrule. The book and recipes are from Chef Thibaud Villanova and was released back in 2022.
There are a lot of good places to buy books online, but the overall best place we’ve found for The Legend of Zelda books is at Amazon. They are the most likely to have a discount and Amazon will sometimes have a buy one get one sale for some of these that makes them even cheaper. The most recent one we saw was during Prime Day this year and we expect to see something similar during Black Friday this year.
Myles Obenza is a freelance writer for IGN. Follow him on Bluesky @mylesobenza.bsky.social.
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