Review by Ian Keogh

Jo lives in Haresden, a place used to magic, but where a form of discomfort and distress is seeping into the town. Jo’s mother is sick, rocks are being thrown at people, yet no-one is seen, and the local witch has died. And that turns out to be the root of the problem.

Sas Milledge’s form of witchcraft is very pastoral, taking place in the countryside and emphasising nature and wildlife. It’s in a field that Jo tracks down a witch to set the story rolling. Orla, though, is no template creation. She’s also in her teens, and in some ways a reluctant witch, although astute and knowledgable. Mamo, the town’s previous witch, was her grandmother, but Orla left to find her own way in the world, with discord between grandmother and granddaughter hinted at.

Just as Orla defies the traditional look of a witch, so do Milledge’s other supernatural creations, more resembling natural creatures or objects, although not quite. If the design impresses, so does the actual art, with delicately drawn people who transmit emotions, and while there’s a manga element to the look, it’s just one part of the bigger picture. The one artistic problem with Mamo is the constant distraction of the distinctive shading Milledge applies to faces and other areas of the body. It could be intended to mark the people of Haresden as human, but different, yet whatever the intention the eye is consistently drawn to the blobs of darkened colour under peoples’ eyes.

Mamo is a quest to put something right, which at face value would be creepy, but Milledge is a sensitive storyteller, and her intention isn’t to gross readers out. Instead she presents a gentle passage of gradual bonding and friendship amid a crisis with magical interludes, some of them surprising.

Although Mamo is only briefly seen there’s a reason she provides the title, and little by little it becomes apparent how comprehensively her influence is sustained. The only narrative error comes right at the end when what’s been friendship is shown to be something more. It feels forced despite the foreshadowing, and Mamo would have been stronger without following that impulse.

However, this quiet exploration of magic has a distinctive voice and a treatment so beguiling you’ll eventually become so absorbed you’ll forget the eccentric shading.