Originally posted here at Anime Radius.

Yen Press, in my mind, has always stood for quality works: Zombie-Loan; Time and Again; Black Butler – and now this, Nightschool, an OEL manga by Svetlana Chmakova in which magic and dark mischief rule the day – err, night. When the sun goes down, that’s when the real fun starts – but in the series, that’s when all the troubles start too, especially for our heroine Alex who is forced to infiltrate the spookiest school on the planet to save her vanished sibling from disappearing completely. The Nightschool is certainly no Hogwarts or even Jordan College from the His Dark Material series of novels; it’s an odd and twisted place where there’s the occasional forest and pond and the layout of the building shifts as day turns to night – and the staff is a bunch of oddballs themselves who are perfectly fitted to work in a place like the Nightschool. But as we follow Alex into her first adventures in the Nightschool, we find out that this school is holding a whole world of secrets and even Alex doesn’t know the half of it. All of the layers of intrigue and secrecy and twists are slowly coming to the surface and it’s hard to stop reading when you’re so invested in finding out what exactly is going on. Spoiler: you won’t find out in this volume . . . but you will certainly be clamoring to get the third volume after reading the last handful of pages. Cliffhangers ahoy!

The Nightschool atmosphere – a mixture of strangely beautiful things and darkly threatening things – is pretty much made by Chmakova’s outstanding artwork. In this volume, there are plenty of delicious scenes featuring the magic spells and unusual happenings that are hallmarks of the series, and it is in these scenes that Chmavoka’s skills truly shine through. For example, look at the scene in which Alex and the head of the student council meet for the first time. It is certainly an explosive occurence, as the air between them literally bursts open with uncontrolled magic – and the visions that had been seen in the graveyard by the Hunters’ seer. Is it classically beautiful? No. But is it extremely eye-catching and inventive? Yes, and I’d rather have Chmavoka’s inventive and creative artwork which keeps the attention drawn to each panel than the dull boring artwork that follows the classical aesthetic seen in some manga.

One of the interesting things about Nightschool so far is that it hasn’t really explained any of the mysteries that run through its main story. There are a lot of questions and practically no answers, and this is something not often seen in an OEL manga. After all, looking at series like Queenie Chan’s The Dreaming or even Chmakova’s own earlier work with Tokyopop, Dramacon: series like those tended to wrap up their main conflict and storylines in 2-3 volumes; rarely does an OEL manga break the five volume mark. There’s Bizenghast and to a certain extent Princess Ai, plus series like Megatokyo which were originally web comics . . . and that’s pretty much it, until now. It looks like Nightschool is aiming for a high mark for many series: keeping the mystery going strong and interesting and being able to extend it through multiple books. Does it have the staying power to do so? If the second volume is any true indication of where this series is going, then it is a definite yes. It is a series any fan of atypical fantasy series would be well advised to keep an eye on; Miss Chmakova is doing amazing things and deserves a large audience of content readers. ( )

The weird just keeps getting weirder. Sarah has disappeared and no one even remembers she ever existed. Alex is having memory loses. Three Hunters have had their time stolen from then. To top it all off, the super hot Mr. Roi keeps refusing to show-up to teach his classes! ( )

The weird just keeps getting weirder. Sarah has disappeared and no one even remembers she ever existed. Alex is having memory loses. Three Hunters have had their time stolen from then. To top it all off, the super hot Mr. Roi keeps refusing to show-up to teach his classes! ( )

The weird just keeps getting weirder. Sarah has disappeared and no one even remembers she ever existed. Alex is having memory loses. Three Hunters have had their time stolen from then. To top it all off, the super hot Mr. Roi keeps refusing to show-up to teach his classes! ( )

The weird just keeps getting weirder. Sarah has disappeared and no one even remembers she ever existed. Alex is having memory loses. Three Hunters have had their time stolen from then. To top it all off, the super hot Mr. Roi keeps refusing to show-up to teach his classes! ( )