I honestly don't know what to think about this graphic novel.

I actually loved the idea of the synopsis, it was an interesting take on an historical event. I did liked how it planed developped and how we're always on the "is magic real or not?".

But I couldn't understand almost anything I've read?? Maybe is it because I'm french and the whole British politics and history is super confusing and obviously something I barely know about. Everything went in so fast and I while I was reading I was still confused on politics and what the hell was happening. Maybe a quick introduction for non-British readers would be best before the actual novel and not at the end?

i don’t have a lot to say about this one, perhaps because i’m not all that into graphic novels, but being a ww2-themed one i thought it might be worth the shot. and it was, in a way; the art was pretty cool and the story itself was nice, but i thought the characters lacked substance and that they were merely archetypes that were never really fleshed out (which is something that /can/ be done within the constrictions of writing a graphic novel – watchmen does it, v for vendetta does it, and i genuinely hoped this one would). it’s an entertaining read, though, so i don’t regret reading it at all.

The Witches of World War II
(Paul Cornell, Valeria Burzo, Jordie Bellaire, TKO Studios, 2023)

This graphic novel has all the right ingredients to be a pulp hit, it's got witches, intrigue, and Nazi's getting beaten up. What more could you want from a graphic novel?

The story follows a group of witches and magicians working for British intelligence in the war against fascism. While this may sound rather outlandish, the book is very firmly built on the foundations of truth. As with all historical fiction, liberties have been taken but it certainly makes for a fun story.

The book is well paced, and we're given brief flashes of backstory, enough to give us understanding of motivations without grinding the story to a halt with exposition.

The artwork is of the traditional style for stories like this, not overly stylized, but certainly striking in places. A few panels stand out, especially during rituals and fighting.

The end of this edition also contains information on the very real people featured in story, and while they are less fantastical it does help us understand the truth, or lack of it, within the book.

Thank you to NetGallery for providing a preview copy of this book.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for an advanced copy in exchange for my honest review!

I originally requested this book because it intrigued me that it was based on real-life pagans. I know in part, some of Aleister Crowley's history, and I knew that Gerald Gardner is referred to as the father of Wicca. (By the way, this book misspells multiple times. It's not "Wica", it's "Wicca". There IS Seax-Wica, which is a denomination of Wicca, but that wasn't created until the 1970's.) This novel felt very...bland. Something about the dialogue felt off and a bit stilted. The dialogue also swaps between barely any to there being way too much of it. I shouldn't be reading a comic page and have more than fifty percent of it be dialogue. I also found myself getting very annoyed by Doreen always responding with "I don't know...I can't..." when asked about her beliefs. She says that exact sentence multiple times, enough for me to notice it and be irritated. The plot was somewhat interesting, though I kept getting lost as to exactly who was doing what for what reason quite a bit. The character building felt a bit surface-level. There one who gets the most fleshed-out character building is Doreen, but even then there is not much to be had. I guess the weak character-building can be partially excused by the fact that the majority of the main cast is based on real-life people. The art style is fine. If you like classic American-style comics, you will probably love this novel's art style. I just personally don't much care for it, there is nothing wrong with it objectively.

E-ARC provided by Netgalley.

I was really intrigued by the story because I love witches and I never heard of the occult movement that happened during the Second World War. The story is based on real people: Aleister Crowley, Gerard Gardner, Dion Fortune, Rollo Ahmed, and Doreen Dominy. These people are the main characters of the story and Doreen can be seen as the narrator of the whole book. She is told to get a group of people together to get Rudolph Hess into coming to Britain. The whole book has a rather obscure atmosphere which I really liked but I wished to have a bit more magical aspects.

I needed a few pages to like the drawing style. It reminded me of the style used in old comic books which I am not the biggest fan of. But I really liked the character design.

The characters especially Doreen were confusing at times. I could not fathom sometimes why they did things that a few pages before were against everything they stand for. Doreen was kind of naïve but also a tough woman in the 40´s. I didn´t get warm with any character mainly because they were not that well developed. But overall, I liked the supporting characters more than the main narrator.
The story is a wild ride and sometimes a bit confusing.
I loved that they included afterwords from Paul Cornell and Professor of History Ronald E. Hutton that explained the reality behind this graphic novel.

I gave the graphic novel 3 stars because I had fun reading the book but was left a bit unsatisfied with the story and the characters.

This one was hard to follow. While I enjoyed the overall meta-context of the story, I felt at times the narrative framing to be disjointed and hard to follow. The art style was intriguing and I loved the use of camo-esque colors to add to the "war" message, but I felt overall let down at the conclusion.

I like the premise but didn't think much of the actual execution. The main character has the silliest hair and the plot is convoluted at best - I rarely knew what was happening or why except that they were up to something to confound the Nazis, but all they did was baffle me! As a result I was often unengaged with the story and got really bored most of the time when I think I was meant to be thrilled by the chapter cliffhangers. Not very good read at all.

I love it when books take real historical events and add fictionalized elements to them. This story was very interesting, and I loved Doreen's character development throughout. I also like that by the end nobody confirms whether magic truly is real, whether Crowley was a con man or not. It was a fun, and interesting quick read.

The Witches of World War II is a good, if pedestrian, graphic novel that explores a group of individuals with ties to various magical practices engaging in espionage during World War II. The idea is interesting, and the execution is good, but it left me wanting more.

The graphic novel focuses on the plot at the expense of the characters. The plot is decent, but the afterword painted portraits of individuals far more interesting than those that appeared in the story itself.

Still, it wasn't a bad read. I enjoyed it.

The characters were very plain with little depth. I found the plot very basic but with the need for a basic understanding of the workings of WWII. The description made the book seem more interesting and intricate than it turned out to be.

This was really enjoyable! I loved the artwork, I loved all of the connections to occultism and how the story left you wondering. There were a few parts that left me a bit confused as far as the backstory and who was working with who, but that was my only real issue. Otherwise- beautiful work and wonderful story!

This failed to live up to it's premise for me. I liked the idea of witchcraft being involved in World War II, and the fact that it was based around a certain amount of fact was enticing to say the least. However, the characters seemed very one dimensional, the story lacking in something I couldn't put my finger on. The cover with it's interesting look but very muted colours sums it up completely for me.

Inspired by the true story of the New Forest Coven and Operation Cone of Power, The Witches of World War II rises above expectations to deliver a solid tale.

3.5 stars - Ebook provided by Netgalley
The Witches of WWII is a graphic novel chronicling the fictionalized events of real occultists and magicians in WWII. The witches joint together under British Intelligence to use the Natzi’s belief of the occult against them.

I rate this graphic novel 3.5 stars as it was enjoyable but I did find the story to be lacking some depth.

I loved the art style it encapsulated the style and colour I associate with WWII. The characters all looked distinct and there was lots of detail in the background of the drawings. The story was fun and light hearted but I found it hard to follow at some points.

A pitfall of the graphic novel, is that prior knowledge of the real people in the novel is needed. The author wove real happenings and real people into the story, which meant that they confined themselves to set plot points. Due to this I found the characters lacked depth and the introductions of the characters didn’t reveal enough for me to connect with them. The plot was enjoyable but I was confused by who was who sometimes and if they were part of the British intelligence or a Natzi.

Overall I found the story enjoyable and would recommend to anyone wanting a quick, fun and low stakes graphic novel to read.

Considering what WWII represents to the world outside of the United States, to Jewish people, to Rromani people..it already feels weird to have comic books coming out about it. But then this was completely confusing. I see what they were trying to do with this but it was not done well. It’s a no for me.

Paul Cornell takes us on one magical movement from Kether to Malkuth in his graphic novel "The Witches of World War II." Astonishingly inspired by real life events, it deft fully weaves together historical figures, an attempt at bringing down Hitler through magic, and posits relationships that might have been.

With the exception of Alister Crowley, I was unfamiliar with the majority of the characters in the book, only learning about them in the afterword with the biographical information. I felt some of this should have been incorporated into the body of the text rather than the end notes.

The Witches of World War II is a graphic novel inspired by the true story of the New Forest Coven and Operation Cone of Power. In this book, we follow Doreen, a 20 year old junior intelligence officer and war widow as she helps form a group of “witches” for a unique mission-capture Hitler’s second in command, Rudolf Hess.

With this being inspired by true events, I was very excited to go into it. A lot of WW2 books I have read focus on the really sad parts of the war, which obviously it is all sad. But I feel like I never really find anything that feels hopeful. So I thought a book about a mission to capture a high ranking nazi would be really interesting.

While I love graphic novels, I feel like the overall story in this one doesn’t quite fit this style of book. It felt very disjointed and confusing because we never got a lot of character development. I feel like someone who is already familiar with this story would really enjoy it but going in knowing nothing about it, I kept getting lost.

The artwork is stunning. The color palette really works for the historical setting. I just wish the story would have explained more about what was going on.

Paul Cornell takes on the not exactly virgin territory of what Britain's mystics got up to in the War, researching what has been said and what can be proven about Aleister Crowley, Dion Fortune, Gerald Gardner, Doreen Valiente and Rollo Ahmed during that period, and then weaving a story which can't quite be disproven, mostly. After all, undercover work like this is just the sort of thing they might not have admitted to even in private, isn't it? The mood is quite Graham Greene, down at heel, unsure of itself - "Doubt is the most British thing of all!" - even as it faces the terrible certainty of the Nazis, with every magician also a confidence trickster to some extent, if only of themselves. The story remains studied in its ambivalence over whether magic is real, while also emphasising the extent to which that question feels irrelevant if the attendant practices and mindset get results. All of this, pleasingly, achieved without too much of the characters being forced into mouthpiece role, or at least not beyond what you'd expect given how much some of them loved the sound of their own voice. Valeria Burzo's art is often lively and characterful, occasionally prone to squidginess, though the most unconvincing bit of it is the sheer scale of Doreen's hairdo, and given the Doreen Valiente Foundation assisted Cornell with this, I bet that is in fact 100% accurate. Just for extra academic cred, there's an afterword from possibly the world's leading expert in witchy gubbins, Ronald Hutton.

(Netgalley ARC)

3.5 stars

This was unique and weird, very promising but that ultimately didn't deliver as much as it promised in terms of story.

Based on a true case of a group of British occultists that fancied themselves wielders of magic and practitioners of witchcraft, and who claimed to have embarked on a psychic war against the Nazis during WWII, this graphic novel uses the real story of these "magicians" to create a fictional tale of espionage and sabotage in which the British intelligence enrolls the help of occultists Aleister Crowley, Gerard Gardner, Dion Fortune, Rollo Ahmed, and Doreen Dominy, the protagonist and narrator, for a mission to lure Rudolf Hess, Germany's heir-presumptive to the Führer into coming to England for a supposed occult revolution bent on ousting the government and handing the isle over to the Germans.

The plot is so insane at times you wonder how much creative licence the writer took with the real story, but at the same time it's plausible and not that hard to believe given all we know about Hess' (and other Nazi bigwigs like Himmler) interest in occultism, paganism, arcane spirituality, and all that esoteric stuff Hitler had personally no patience for. You won't be left wondering, though, because both Paul Cornell and Professor of History Ronald E. Hutton have two afterwords each in which they explain separately what's historical and what's made up for the sake of the plot, as well as the former explaining why he wrote this as it is. Broadly summing up what both say, the characters were real and their beliefs in the occult and magic were real, but their "magic" wasn't like in this graphic novel, and Hess' flight was real enough though far more mysterious as to motives. The rest is fictional.

The story feels incomplete, however. Like there's more that was ultimately cut and left out; transition between chapters is bumpy and everything feels both confusingly slow and too rapid when it picks up speed, it feels compressed, and making the magic real gave this an unrealistic twist that I didn't like. Hess' strange behaviour is even more erratic here, because after ordering the killing of one of the important characters, he suddenly decides to go to England? He reacts as the plot needs, and the circle of witches is never challenged hard but everything goes according to plan. It's just too easy for them.

Doreen was a disappointment as a character, too. She goes from a rational translator at Bletchley Park, that collection of super-geniuses working with British intelligence to thwart Nazi plans and decode their encrypted comms, to a dabbler in witchcraft... despite witnessing what a bunch of frauds and con artists they all are. I never felt a sense of why exactly she had such a change of heart, because she's always doubting. It would've made more sense if she'd stayed the sceptic she started out as instead of becoming a witch by conviction. Crowley was far more consistent and always acted in-character from beginning to end, as were the other supporting characters, but this also makes her inconsistent and not that well-developed character all the more disappointing.

All in all, an interesting story that sent me into reading up on the true events to learn more, but that was ultimately very unsatisfying. The art is lovely, though, with a nice palette and design, and I liked that some panels have an appearance reminiscent of a film noir.

Thank you NetGalley and TKO Presents for giving me the opportunity to read an advanced readers copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

That was… different. I really went into it with zero expectations, but I was confident it was going to be my cup of tea. I mean—World War II? Witches? World War II AND witches? I can never say no to that.

The art was beautiful, the idea was crazy good—I can’t even believe it was inspired by real people! But…it kind of fell flat. I wanted more, so much more from it.

I almost never read introductions and afterwords, but I appreciated the ones written by the writer and Prof. Ronald E. Hutton; they answered some of my questions and shed a light on a part of history I never knew existed (not the same witchcraft portrayed in the story, but close enough).