A Witch’s Printing Office vols 1-2

Mika is trapped in a magical world where magic users excel at one type of magic or one spell, and these spells are recorded in magical tomes. Mika is convinced that someone, somewhere in this world, has the spell that can send her home. If only she could create something that would bring all these magic users together! To this end, she decides to create the Magical Market, or Magiket, styled heavily after Comiket in Japan and reminiscent of other larger fan events like Comic Con. To further support her Magiket, Mika has started a business for mass producing tomes for magic users.

Volume two explores more of the world outside of the Magiket, as Mika expands the capabilities of her printing office. This volume is full of business dealings and showcases Mika’s shrewd business-sense and dedication to profit over everything else. Mika happens upon a magical sword stuck in a stump that’s about to be discarded from a town square, so she capitalizes on its magically enhanced sharpness and arranges for it to become their newest paper cutter. An order calling for red dragon hide sends Mika and her crew into the lair of a dragon, only for Mika to strike a deal to supply the dragon with books in exchange for the dragon’s sloughed skin.

I keep thinking I missed a volume before volume one. The summary text from the publisher focuses on Mika getting sucked into this world, but the action begins after Mika is already in this fantasy world and gearing up for her first Magiket. Mika spends two sentences talking about being pulled away from Tokyo into this world, and there are only a few other mentions in the first two volumes to remind readers that she is supposed to be looking for a spell to take her home.  Rather than this being a major plot point, volume one spends most of its time explaining how Mika organized the Magiket, including crowd control, arranging popular booths away from each other, and putting together a program so attendees can find the booths they want.  For anyone who has gone to a fandom event, these pieces will be very familiar, right down to the line break signs.

Volume two doubles down on some of the ludicrous measures Mika will go to keep her business thriving, and there are some exceptionally humorous moments.  Within the first two volumes, there isn’t much world-building to explain exactly how the magic tomes work, or why one of the staff members is an anthropomorphic bear.  Mika seems completely at ease with all of these eccentricities, explained away on the back cover by her being a fan of Role-Playing Games.

Miyama’s illustrations are extremely detailed, down to the individual scales on the dragon hide books.  Characters are designed really intricately as well with beautiful clothing and accessories.  There are several well-endowed female characters, but they are so far all adult women.

Overall, it seems like Mika’s main goal of finding someone with the magic to send her back home is a complete afterthought. If you also forget that’s the reason for the Magiket, you will enjoy this funny, light hearted story that blends frenzies like Comic Con with love for books and a fantasy realm.  It’s humorous to see tenets from our world super-imposed in this fantasy world, but overall, there are better isekai fantasy-humor series.  Consider That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime or The Devil is a Part-Timer.

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