Welcome to the かえるくん、東京を救う / Super Frog Saves Tokyo 
Book Club! Starting August 15!
Join the Beginner Book Club Here!
View this book on [Natively!]
Who do you call when Tokyo is in peril and Captain Japan is busy? Yes…. it’s time for Super Frog!
Katigiri arrives home from his job as a collection agent at a bank to discover … a giant frog waiting for him! The frog tells him that in three days, a giant earthquake will strike Tokyo unless the two go underground to battle a giant worm. How can Katigiri say no to this request?
To find out more about Super Frog and Katigiri’s quest, join us in reading this story!
This story is by Haruki Murakami, one of Japan’s most well-known contemporary authors. If you would like to learn more about him and his writing, this is his official website.
View the nomination post here!
Where to purchase
Please note that there are several different versions of this book. It is part of Haruki Murakami’s short story collection 神の子どもたちはみな踊る (English title 'After the Quake"), there is a bilingual book with Japanese and English text (digitally only in Japan), and it has appeared in other collections. I strongly recommend that you view previews of these versions on Amazon or Bookwalker before choosing the book format that you feel is best for you.
Short Story Collection 神の子どもたちはみな踊る (English title 'After the Quake")
Amazon: physical copy and digital copy
Bookwalker digital copy
Rakuten physical copy
Kobo digital copy
Bilingual Book Super Frog Saves Tokyo かえるくん、東京を救う (Digital only, can only be purchased in Japan)
Amazon · Bookwalker
Hardcover Manga : かえるくん、東京を救う Haruki Murakami 9 Stories
Amazon
Schedule
Please note that there are schedules for the bilingual version and the short story collection. I have subdivided the story based on the divisions in the bilingual version and applied these breaks to the short story version, so unfortunately, if you are reading the bilingual version, we stop in the middle of pages (but please read ahead if you wish).
Bilingual Book
With the bilingual version, each section begins with an English translation, then the Japanese version, followed by a Japanese description of why the translator chose those particular words in English (which you may wish to skip). It will look like a lot of pages, but if you only focus on the parts that you do not understand, the reading will be much shorter.
| Week | Start Date | Parts | Page Numbers | Page Count |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Week 1 | August 15 | Parts 1 to 5 | 12 - 65 | 53 |
| Week 2 | August 22 | Parts 6 to 10 | 66 - 112 | 46 |
| Week 3 | August 29 | Parts 11 to 15 | 113 - 165 | 42 |
| Week 4 | September 5 | Parts 16 to 21 | 166 - 227 | 51 |
| Week 5 | September 12 | Parts 22 to 27 | 228 - 283 | 55 |
| Week 6 | September 19 | Parts 28 to 33 | 284 - 342 | 58 |
| Week 7 | September 26 | Parts 33 to 39 | 343 - end | 65 |
Short Story Collection
Please note that these page numbers are from the digital version of the short story collection linked in the ‘Where to purchase’ section. If you have a different version, the page numbers will be different.
Because of the structure of the bilingual book, our reading will usually not be at the end of a page. The paragraph numbers will be provided, but my apologies if they are confusing. In the weekly posts, the first and last lines of text will be provided to make this easier.
| Week | Start Date | Start | End | Page Count |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Week 1 | August 15 | 60, beginning | 61, para. 13 | 1.7 |
| Week 2 | August 22 | 61, para. 14 | 63, para. 3 | 1.7 |
| Week 3 | August 29 | 63, para. 4 | 64, para. 9 | 1.7 |
| Week 4 | September 5 | 64, para. 10 | 66, para. 17 | 2 |
| Week 5 | September 12 | 66, para. 18 | 68, para. 4 | 2 |
| Week 6 | September 19 | 68, para. 5 | 70, para. 5 | 2 |
| Week 7 | September 26 | 70, para. 6 | end | 2 |
Vocabulary
Vocabulary list.
Please read the guidelines on the first page before adding any words.
Discussion Guidelines
Spoiler Courtesy
Please follow these rules to avoid inadvertent ネタバレ. If you’re unsure whether something should have a spoiler tag, err on the side of using one.
- Any potential spoiler for the current week’s reading need only be covered by a spoiler tag. Predictions and conjecture made by somebody who has not read ahead still falls into this category.
- Any potential spoilers for external sources need to be covered by a spoiler tag and include a label (outside of the spoiler tag) of what might be spoiled. These include but are not limited to: other book club picks, other books, games, movies, anime, etc. I recommend also tagging the severity of the spoiler (for example, I may still look at minor spoilers for something that I don’t intend to read soon).
- Any information from later in the book than the current week’s reading (including trigger warnings that haven’t yet manifested) needs to be hidden by spoiler tags and labeled as coming from later sections.
Instructions for Spoiler Tags
Click the cog above the text box and use either the “Hide Details” or “Blur Spoiler” options. The text which says “This text will be hidden” should be replaced with what you are wishing to write. In the case of “Hide Details”, the section in the brackets that is labelled “Summary” can be replaced with whatever you like also (i.e, [details=”Chapter 1, Pg. 1”]).
Hide Details results in the dropdown box like below:
Example
This is an example of the “Hide Details” option.
The “Blur Spoiler” option will simply blur the text it surrounds.
This is an example of the “Blur Spoiler” option.
Posting Advice
-
When asking for help, please mention the page number, and check before posting that your question hasn’t already been asked. As the threads get longer, it becomes more convenient to use the Search function, which is located in the upper right corner of the forum. It is the magnifying glass which is near your profile picture! The best way to search is usually to type part of the sentence you are confused about, and select “in this topic”. This will show you all posts within the current thread which has that string of text.
-
Be sure to join the conversation! It’s fun, and it’s what keeps these book clubs lively! There’s no such thing as a stupid question! We are all learning here, and if the question has crossed your mind, there’s a very good chance it has crossed somebody else’s also! Asking and answering questions is a great learning opportunity for everyone involved, so never hesitate to do so!
Different versions: Please note that there are several different versions of this story. Though we will try to include page numbers for the different versions, these may not always be accurate or may not be available to the person posting.
For the Kindle version of this manga, the page numbers and the location number are always 3 apart. If you subtract 3 from the location, this will give you the accurate page number!
OR
Please use the chapter page numbers, instead of the volume page numbers. These are located in between the panels!
Proper Nouns
Example:
| Name | Reading | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| 片桐 | かたぎり | Mr. Katagiri, Main character |
| かえるくん | Froggy, Main character | |
| ミミズくん | Giant worm, villain |
Resources
Jisho is a popular online Japanese-English dictionary.
ichi.moe is a tool for parsing out sentences. You can type/paste in a whole sentence and it will try and break the sentence down into its individual parts.
Deepl will translate a sentence from Japanese to English. It’s obviously not going to be right all the time, so if you want to check your translation it’s often better to ask in the thread
Membership
- Yes
- Yes, but I might start late
- Maybe
- No
- Short story collection 神の子どもたちはみな踊る (After the Quake)
- Bilingual book かえるくん、東京を救う
- A different version
- So many versions! My brain is about to explode!
How fast would you like to read?
- Super Frog inspires me to read super fast! 5 weeks
- Super interested, but not super fast. 6 weeks.
- Super good, not so super fast. 7 weeks.
- Super much to do in my life… how about 8 weeks?
How soon would you like to start?
The current book club 黄泉のツガイ・Yomi no Tsugai will finish on approximately August 8.
- August 8 (no break)
- August 15 (one-week break)
- August 22 (two-week break)