The Magic Order, Volume 1

You have seen this expression, “Harry Potter for adults” all over the place in marketing books. I know right off the Lev Grossman's The Magicians has certainly been marketed that way. It is a much closer approximation to the Harry Potter universe than this story is, but you get a general idea. Lots of books for adults want to capture the kind of magic that Harry Potter battling evil unbeknownst to muggles captures for kids. This is one of those books that loosely attempts at this.

The premise of the story is there are five families of magicians who protect the world. This isn't staged magic, although some of the members of the families make their bread and butter by doing tricks. This is real magic. They use their skills to protect humanity from the dark and more nefarious arts and those who would take advantage of humanity. Good and evil families battle for power. In the middle of the battle for power is a highly dysfunctional family, The Moonstones.

Things fall apart as members of the families get assassinated one by one, till the center cannot hold. The narrative and pacing of the story are pretty flat, you know what is going to happen from the second page. However, the assassination scenes are very creative and interesting. Where this story shines is Coipel's artwork. It is stellar. Gorgeous. It brings flat scenes up to par and makes them jump off of the page.

If you like comics with a magic bend to them, this isn't bad.