Pacheco and the Witch of the Mountain - Juan E. Zambrano - ★★★★.½

AUTHOR: Juan E. Zambrano

GENRE: Middle-Grade Graphic Novel.

PUBLICATION DATE: June 17, 2025.

RATING: 4.5 stars.

In a Nutshell: A middle-grade graphic novel about a boy who dreams of becoming a witch. Great human and animal characters, wonderful storyline, excellent balance of humour and seriousness, good life lessons, adorable art. Much recommended to the target age group!

Plot Preview:

Pacheco always dreams of practising magic, even if his father and his grandfather, both fishermen, are opposed to the idea. After all, boys can’t be witches! But when the family business begins to suffer, Pacheco is sure that he can use magic to help his family and his village, even if it means begging the grumpy witch Doris to take him on as an apprentice. Once he begins his training. He discovers a whole other world, with a new set of rules and restrictions. Can Pacheco bend the existing norms and prove that boys indeed have what it takes to perform magic?

Bookish Yays:

🔮 Pacheco: lead character extraordinaire, with a strong preference for Gen-Z utterisms. 😄 He’s not portrayed as perfect; he makes mistakes, but he also apologises for the same. This makes him an even better lead.

🔮 Pacheco’s father and grandfather: limited roles and yet, such a fabulous presence! Loved them both!

🔮 The humour, whether in the illustrations or the conversations – so much fun! There’s also some slapstick comedy, thanks to the above two characters. I am not usually fond of physical comedy, but it works nicely in this book, and little readers are sure to laugh out loud.

🔮 Doris: An amazing mentor who teaches Pacheco much more than magic.

🔮 The myriad birds and animals. Wow!

🔮 The South American feel thanks to the author’s Venezuelan heritage.

🔮 The reversal of the more common gender roles, with the matriarchal witch society placing restrictions on boys.

🔮 The tempo: quite fast. There’s a lot happening without affecting the pace.

🔮 The ending: perfect for the story. No forced HEAs, no incomplete arcs.

🔮 The illustrations: fabulous! The colours are wonderfully vivid, with the magical scenes coming with some nice sparkly touches. The hues match the emotions of the scenes well, going bright and dull as needed. I love the characters and their expressions the most. I also appreciate how the characters came in various sizes and skin tones.

Bookish If Onlys:

💫 Some plot points were left without much clarification. The initial “light show”, the part about pulling magic from animals (this might be to avoid scaring little readers, but I would have preferred at least a little background about the process), the reason why the villagers didn’t trust the witches, the absence of men in the witch world (and the absence of women in Pacheco’s family),… These don’t affect the book greatly, but some more detailing would have helped.

💫 As the secondary characters are numerous, their development is somewhat limited. I’d have loved to know some of them more; they had such an intriguing personality!

💫 I wish there had been at least some panels where Pacheco shows regret or guilt about not having informed his family before residing with Doris. Kids need to learn that (most) parents panic if their children aren’t home by the predecided time, and the resultant anger is just a manifestation of their love.

Overall, this was an amazing graphic novel. It delivers on almost all aspects: story, writing, characters, humour, emotions, ending, and artwork. Though a few things could have been detailed better, the rest ensured a memorable reading experience. Both my young in-house readers accompanied me on this journey, and they enjoyed the book as much as I did. If this is meant to be a series, we are definitely on board for the sequel(s).

Certainly recommended to little fantasy lovers! The official target age is 9-11 year olds, but I think this debut work reads a bit young. Then again, it was a fun book to read, so let me just expand the age range and recommended it to 7-11 year olds.

My thanks to Andrews McMeel Publishing for providing the DRC of “Pacheco and the Witch of the Mountain” via Edelweiss+. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the book.