Join the Absolute Beginner Book Club Here!
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Tina and her brother Nicholas live in a cozy little village in Finland. Together, they run a soup shop that is very popular among the locals. One day, Nicholas sees a dandelion floating near the window of their house. Upon grabbing hold of it, he locks it in a jar. Unexpectedly, the flower transforms into a cute little being! The siblings melt in its presence, and they immedietally adopt it.
Dressed in a small sweater that was knitted for him, Kesaran becomes a member a member of their family, and he will live plenty of adventures, each one funnier than the next. He will even help the siblings make new recipes as a small chef.
View the nomination post here!
How it works
We create a reading schedule, with a set number of pages to work through each week. Each week we create a new discussion thread for that week’s reading. In those threads we discuss everything from vocab and grammar to the characters and story. We try to help each other by contributing to the shared vocab list, by answering each other’s questions and by keeping each other motivated.
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!
How do I join in?
- Get yourself a copy of the book (see “Where to purchase” below)
- Click on the participation poll below to let us know you’re planning to join in
- Set this thread to “watching” so you get updates on the group (go just past the last post in this thread, click on the grey box that says “normal” or “tracking” and change this to “watching”)
Where to purchase
Bookwalker
Rakuten/kobo
Amazon JP
Schedule
| Week | Date | Pages | Chapter |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 3/28 | 3-9 | 1 |
| 2 | 4/4 | 10-15 | 1 |
| 3 | 4/11 | 16-24 | 1 |
| 4 | 4/18 | 25-36 | 2 |
| 5 | 4/25 | 37-50 | 3 |
| 6 | 5/2 | 51-62 | 4 |
| 7 | 5/9 | 63-74 | 5 |
| 8 | 5/16 | 75-88 | 6 |
| 9 | 5/23 | 89-100 | 7 |
| 10 | 5/30 | 101-114 | 8, 9 |
| 11 | 6/6 | 115-126 | 10 |
| 12 | 6/13 | 127-138 | 11 |
| 13 | 6/20 | 139-160 | 12, 13 |
| 14 | 6/27 | 161-177 | 番外編, 14 |
Resources and vocabulary
- Advice for those new to reading
- Jisho is a popular online Japanese-English dictionary.
- Manga Kotoba has an auto-generated frequency list for all the words used in the volume.
- 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 normally better to ask in the thread.
Membership
- Yes
- Yes, but I might start late
- I’m reading after the book club has finished
- Maybe
- No
- Digital
- Physical
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Red Alert 
