Stones of Power by Azumi Isora (Manga Review)

Café Renard seems to be your run-of-the-mill establish, but it is more than meets the eye. When strangers stumble upon the hidden secret within an average business front, they find a mysterious woman selling stones with magical properties. Before they know it they are transported on strange adventures of science fiction and fantasy. 

Stones of Power have a lot of elements of sci-fi, fantasy and a little element of folklore. The story is well written by Azumi Isora. One thing I enjoyed reading in Stones of Power is the characters and the plot. The plot surrounds a mysterious place called Café Renard where strange things happen on a regular basis. In fact the weird activity is so common that the Café has a problem keeping employees there. One day our main protagonist Harushige Fujita visits the Café to pick up a stone for his sister. Fujita brings the stone home and strange things start to happen. He begins to have visions of a man asking for his help. For the sake of the plot I won’t go deep into spoilers. I will say Isora has written a story I didn’t expect. 

The story is refreshing, with great pacing and Isora surrounds Harushige with a well balance supporting cast. One of the outstanding supporting cast members is Youko. Youko runs the shop with her brother and she is surrounded in mystery. Youko relationship with Harushige is an interesting one. These two have a lot of common, but you can tell something is very odd about Youko and I love Harushige dealings with her. Youko brother who runs the shop is also well written. His relationship with Harushige has a lot of comedy relief which gives another element to the tone of the book. I love the interaction between these two. Their relationship has a master and student type of vibe with a lot of bickering and moments to make you laugh. Overall the plot is great in the first and second act. The pacing is well done but does slow down during the second chapter to give more explanation on the characters. This was welcomed as I understood the characters a little bit more.

Finally the art looks great. Youko looks great especially when her facial expressions show case emotions. If you’re a fan of sci-fi fantasy manga Stones of Powers is something you might want to check out. 

Final Score – 8.0/10