TRANS-SCRIBE: Witch of Thistle Castle Vol.1 by John Tarachine

'Spirits and magic are everywhere in the streets of Edinburgh – if only you dare to see it! Dive into this heartfelt manga about a witch and her apprentice as they try to find their place in a world that hates their very existence.

'The last in a long line of Witches of the Black Wood, Marie Blackwood lives a quiet life in Edinburgh – away from the scrutiny of the Church. But when the Church thrusts 13-year-old Theo into her hands for safekeeping, Marie suddenly gains the responsibility not just of taking care of a teenager – but protecting the world, and Theo himself, from the amazing power that lives inside of him.'

Edinburgh is a place that has become associated with magic and the supernatural over the years. From the various ghost tours and walks, to the creepy underground city, or just the old buildings and wonderfully beautiful architecture, the city has become a place where people expect to find something a little otherworldly; and literature has embraced this. The latest book to make use of the spookiness of Edinburgh is Witch of Thistle Castle, a manga series that follows a witch trying to live a quiet life, but ends up in charge of a teen with immense power.

The story is set in an alternate world, where magic and witches are real, but under the strict control of the church, who have a more active role in world affairs. Marie Blackwood is a witch living a quiet life in Edinburgh, running a magic shop and trying to keep off the church's radar. However, one day a pair of church officials arrive on her doorstep with a teenage boy, shackled and wearing a strange mask. They tell Marie that the boy, Theo, is dangerous, that he contains a powerful and destructive magic called Blood of Righteous Anger. Unable to control or contain Theo's power anymore, the church put him in Marie's care to be trained by her.

Thus begins the end of Marie's quiet, ordered life. Now she must try to find a way to care for this strange, sheltered boy, and teach him about the world of magic and spirits that he knows almost nothing about.

Most of the book is given over to this concept, with the audience learning about this world, the way that magic works, and the rules that govern it, along with Theo. We're given very little context at the beginning as to how anything works, and readers are dropped into the middle of things and expected to catch up. Sometimes this leads to some fun revelations and interesting moments of lore drops, but more often than not it ends up with the reader having to just go along with stuff that has no explanation, hoping that we eventually get one.

The relationship between Marie and Theo gets given a big focus here, with the isolated and set in her ways Marie having to slowly open herself up to not just living with another person, but actually caring for someone else too. For his part, Theo is very much a blank slate. He seems to have next to no experience of the world, as his personality is kind of a blank too. He shuffles through most of the book, just going with the flow, demonstrating very little self determination or drive.

One of the things that this first volume seems to be setting up, which often comes across as feeling slightly gross, is a romance between the two leads. We're never given an age for Marie, but based upon the way she's drawn and how she acts she feels to be at least in her twenties. Theo, however, is only thirteen. There are multiple times when people refer to Marie having 'a man' in her life now, with a bit of a wink and a nudge to imply romance, and Theo is complimented on his beauty multiple times. There's also a scene where Marie bursts in on a fully naked Theo in the shower, and another where Marie leaves her room in underwear that barely hide her ample figure. A few scenes with intimate touching and blushing faces are thrown in too. It's very uncomfortable to read. Even if Marie is as young as eighteen it would still make the relationship paedophilic, and the fact that the book not only seems okay with this romance, but pushes it multiple times makes it feel kind of gross.

Towards the end of the book a story involving the French church is introduced, and it seems like things are being set up to take the story in a fairly interesting direction. A few new characters are thrown into the mix, one of which seems so obviously sinister and shifty that he has to be a villain. Unfortunately, the book kind of just ends. There's no reveal, no cliffhanger, nothing that makes you eager to read the next volume; it just peters out.

The art on the book is decent in places, with some interesting designs and the depictions of Edinburgh feel enough like the city that they're instantly recognisable. The lead character are given a lot of attention, and are nicely detailed, but other characters don't quite get the same treatment; the two church officials who bring Theo to Marie in the beginning look more like rough sketches than finalised characters, and feel odd on the page thanks to the lack of detail on them. The spirits and magical entities that exist in the world have some good designs to them though, and there are some interesting stuff that pops up occasionally that I can't help but feel would make the book more interesting if they were given a bigger focus.

Overall, I found Witch of Thistle Castle to be a strange read. Nothing much of note happens in the book, and whilst there are hints at a bigger world and a more complex tale there's not much here to grab attention. The rules and workings of the world are given only cursory explanations, and there's still a lot of unanswered questions or things that the reader is just expected to go along with. The aforementioned strange romantic sub-plot also ends up leaving something of an unsavoury taste in the mouth too, and made me uncomfortable enough to want to put the book down more than one occasion too. This series may get better in time, and I'm sure there are some who'd enjoy it already, but at the moment there's not enough here to get me excited for volume two.