This is the main thread for reading the manga ふたつのスピカ volume 1 together with the Intermediate Manga Club.
We’ll be reading together according to a weekly schedule, ask and answer questions in weekly threads, and we have a vocabulary sheet we’re building together to make this easier for everyone.
In 2010 AD, Japan’s first manned space exploration rocket “Lion” crashed into an urban area, causing a catastrophic accident that resulted in many casualties. Asumi, a young girl who lost her mother in the accident, meets the ghost of the pilot of the crashed spacecraft, Mr. Lion, and sets her sights on becoming an astronaut.
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!
Will you be reading with us?
Yeah!
Yeah, but I’ll start late
I’m not sure yet
I’m skipping this one
I’ve read this before, but will join in the discussion
0voters
How will you be reading?
Physical
Digital
With my eyes
I’m not sure yet
0voters
Don’t forget to set this thread to Watching in order to be notified when weekly threads get posted!
So, I’ve already written up a tentative schedule - fairly straightforward one chapter a week. We could, if people feel it’s necessary, split the first chapter in half, but I don’t really know if that’s necessary.
I didn’t understand the name of the manga, or know what Spica was. Having looked it up, the clues were all there on the cover - I just didn’t know enough about space!
Looking forward to this one. First published in Sep 2001, it’s going to be one of the older manga I’ve read in Japanese. I like the slightly retro art style flicking through the first pages.
I find that I often like these “older” manga more than more recent ones, at least on average, because I find that over the past 20 years or so the format has become extremely calibrated, especially visually. Of course there’s also a selection bias, we don’t remember the low effort stuff from the 80s.
Maybe the real reason is that if we’re still reading these books 20 years later, they’re probably not terrible…
Rah the BookWalker scan quality is trash. I regret not pirating it instead. If you want me to pay for your DRM-infested books that I can only read on your proprietary apps, the least you could do is give me proper scans…
One week to go. I’ve added the vocab sheet to the first post - it’s definitely much shorter than Bocchi’s. Someone please let me know if I’ve got the settings wrong.
Other than Simias, then, how are people going at sourcing their copy?
Woah, the first 3 volumes are on sale for 56 Yen everywhere, not just Bookwalker but also Kobo (haven’t checked the others). Shame I’d already bought it.
Wouldn’t it be nice if it were just Bookwalker? But the scans are provided by the publisher, aren’t they? So it doesn’t matter where you buy it or pirat it, you still end up with a low quality product. I hate this, because the scan quality directly impacts my reading ability and enjoyment.
I’ve never been involved in that step of the process, but I’m fairly sure the Jolly Roger version is typically produced by pulling apart a physical copy so that the pages can be scanned flat.
That said, my ahem copy isn’t all that awesome. It’s readable, but the contrast is a bit on the low side.
That was true once, but not so much these days. From what I’ve heard but in no way seen first hand, nowadays it’s just people stripping the DRM from these same low quality copies and providing them as-is.
If you’re so inclined, you could try running all the scans (from your own copy of course ) through https://www.waifu2x.net and see if it improves the quality.
I previously mentioned the series being long as a reason for not joining, but a bigger one is the low quality scans. I just don’t feel like reading something this blurry.
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