Witch Hat Atelier, Vol. 1

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Witch Hat Atelier is the first manga I've ever read! It came highly recommended to me, so I jumped right in. It took me all of 30 seconds to get the hang of reading it – backwards to me – but there were a few pages were I did get confused. BUT THAT'S NEITHER HERE NOR THERE.

Witch Hat Atelier Vol 1 is SUCH a delightful little story. It's about children, but it's not childish. Hopefully, you understand the distinction there. There's no real violence, and no real harm comes to anyone. It's about discovery, about learning, and above all, about the love of magic. As someone who grew up absolutely wishing with all my might that Hogwarts was real and that I'd get to go, well, I identified with Coco a great deal. She's a sweet, sweet little girl, and I can't wait to see where her lessons take her.

NOW onto the REAL reason I picked Witch Hat Atelier up – the art itself. Holy crap - it is absolutely breathtakingly gorgeous. Even on the ‘regular' frames. It's all beautiful. And the spreads? Oh my god. There was more than one in this volume where I had to stop and really appreciate it for more than a couple of minutes. It's so pretty. The way the artist does hair, especially? And draping fabric? Gah. Gorgeous.

So all-in-all this was a fantastic first manga for me. Five stars!