A dark magical girl story in the vein of Madoka, Natalie Maher‘s first Magical Girl Mechanical Heart novel explores expressions of slavery (both mental and physical), PTSD, clinical depression, mania, disassociation, and self-delusion. It is, to re-iterate, quite dark. Ultimately though most of its characters strive to rise above their issues, which results in there being a distinctive string of hope threaded throughout.
Lighter, but by no means light (more akin to PreCure I guess), is Erin Elkin‘s A Little Vice. This magical girl story focuses almost entirely on one particularly messy journey of self-discovery with some abusive parenting thrown in on the side. It’s extremely bittersweet with some mixed messaging alongside a questionable ending, and the structure is odd enough that I’m unsure whether or not it’s supposed to be a stand-alone work.