本陣殺人事件 (Advanced Book Club)

Japanese Language Reading
#1

Join the Advanced Book Club here!

Welcome to 本陣殺人事件

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Where to buy

Amazon paperback | Amazon Kindle | Bookwalker | Note that we will only read the titular story, not the whole book.

Discussion Threads and Reading Schedule

We started reading on Jan 1st, 2022.

Week Start Date Chapter Names Page Count
Week 1 Jan 1st 「三本指の男」、「本陣の末裔」、「琴鳴りぬ」 ~28.5
Week 2 Jan 8th 「大惨劇」、「琴爪の新用途」、「鎌と琴柱」 ~30.5
Week 3 Jan 15th 「捜査会議」、「金田一耕助」 ~25.5
Week 4 Jan 22nd 「猫の墓」、「探偵小説問答」 ~23.5
Week 5 Jan 29th 「二通の手紙」、「墓をあばいて」 ~25.5
Week 6 Feb 5th 「礒川警部警倒す」、「耕助の実験」、「本陣の悲劇」 ~31
Week 7 Feb 12th 「予行演習」、「止むを得ざる密室」、「曼珠沙華」 ~32

Discussion Rules

  • Please use spoiler tags for major events in the current chapter(s) and any content in future chapters.
  • When asking for help, please mention the chapter and page number. Also mention what version of the book you are reading.
  • Don’t be afraid of asking questions, even if they seem embarrassing at first. All of us are here to learn.
  • To you lurkers out there: Join the conversation, it’s fun!

Member List

Are you planning to read 本陣殺人事件 with the book club?

  • Yes
  • Yes, but I might start late
  • Not sure
  • No

0 voters

If so, which version will you be reading?

  • eBook
  • Paperback

0 voters

Proper Noun Readings

Proper Nouns
Name Reading Notes Proof
井上 英三 いのうえ えいぞう Narrator’s friend (Chapter 1: 三本指の男) (Week 1)
一柳 賢蔵 いちやなぎ けんぞう Head of the family, eldest son, 40 yo, philosopher, lives with his parents
一柳 糸子 いちやなぎ いとこ Kenzou’s mother, widow, 57 yo (Chapter 2: 本陣の末裔)
一柳 妙子 いちやなぎ たえこ Second child, eldest daughter, lives in Shanghai
一柳 隆二 いちやなぎ りゅうじ Third child, second son, 35yo, doctor in Osaka
一柳 三郎 いちやなぎ さぶろう Fourth child, third son, 25yo, lives with his parents
一柳 鈴子 いちやなぎ すずこ Fifth child, second daughter, 17yo, lives with her parents
一柳 良介 いちやなぎ りょうすけ Cousin of the five children, 38yo
一柳 秋子 いちやなぎ あきこ 良介’s wife
久保 克子 くぼ かつこ 賢蔵’s fiancé
久保 林吉 くぼ りんきち 克子’s father, deceased, fruit farmer
玉 鈴子’s cat
久保 銀造 くぼ ぎんぞう 克子’s uncle and the one who raised her/supports her (Week 2)
源七 げんしち 作男
週吉 しゅうきち The miller/小作
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Advanced Japanese Book Club (Now reading: 本陣殺人事件)
Advanced Japanese Book Club (Now reading: 本陣殺人事件)
Week 1: 本陣殺人事件
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Week 2: 本陣殺人事件
#2

Hello and welcome to the 本陣殺人事件 reading club!

First of all, let’s agree on a schedule.

Lengthy Schedule Options Description

The book consists of 18 chapters:

Chapter Title Pages
1 三本指の男 9.5
2 本陣の末裔 9.5
3 琴鳴りぬ 9.5
4 大惨劇 11
5 琴爪の新用途 9.5
6 鎌と琴柱 10
7 捜査会議 14.5
8 金田一耕助 11
9 猫の墓 12
10 探偵小説問答 11.5
11 二通の手紙 12
12 墓をあばいて 13.5
13 礒川警部警倒す 12.5
14 耕助の実験 9.5
15 本陣の悲劇 9
16 予行演習 9.5
17 止むを得ざる密室 14.5
18 曼珠沙華 8

Note that the page numbers are not exactly reliable as I recalculated them from my Bookwalker ebook pages, but I hope we are not too fussed about one page more or less per chapter :sweat_smile:
(Having said that, if anybody has page numbers from a paperback book, I’m happy to adjust.)

The book is not extremely old, but still it was written in the 1940s so we can expect to encounter some slightly old-fashioned grammar and vocabulary. Also, we had some warnings about long-winding descriptions and difficult vocabulary throughout the book. So we should aim at maybe 30 pages max per week? On the other hand, this is supposed to be a short book club, so we should stay within the limits of 7 or 8 weeks altogether.

Based on these restrictions I started to figure out some suitable schedules, but I was so blown away by the sheer number of possible combinations that I decided to sit down and write a program that would find the optimal answer(s) to this question :joy_cat:
(BTW optimal in this context means, where the maximum number of pages of any given week is lowest.)

Anyways, here are the results:

7 Weeks (optimal)

This is the optimal schedule for 7 weeks:

Week Chapters Pages
1 1, 2, 3 28.5
2 4, 5, 6 30.5
3 7, 8 25.5
4 9, 10 23.5
5 11, 12 25.5
6 13, 14, 15 31
7 16, 17, 18 32

8 Weeks (optimal)

The optimal schedule for 8 weeks:

Week Chapters Pages
1 1, 2, 3 28.5
2 4, 5 20.5
3 6, 7 24.5
4 8, 9 23
5 10, 11 23.5
6 12, 13 26
7 14, 15, 16 28
8 17, 18 22.5

At this point I noticed that in both cases the first week would be among the longest ones (for 7 weeks) or even the longest one altogether (for 8 weeks) and so I decided to add a slow-start option to my program as well. Here are the results:

7 Weeks (slow start)

Week Chapters Pages
1 1, 2 19
2 3, 4, 5 30
3 6, 7 24.5
4 8, 9, 10 34.5
5 11, 12 25.5
6 13, 14, 15 31
7 16, 17, 18 32

7 Weeks (even slower start)

Week Chapters Pages
1 1, 2 19
2 3, 4 20.5
3 5, 6, 7 34
4 8, 9, 10 34.5
5 11, 12 25.5
6 13, 14, 15 31
7 16, 17, 18 32

8 Weeks (slow start)

Week Chapters Pages
1 1, 2 19
2 3, 4, 5 30
3 6, 7 24.5
4 8, 9 23
5 10, 11 23.5
6 12, 13 26
7 14, 15, 16 28
8 17, 18 22.5

Before setting up a poll, I thought I’d give y’all a moment to think about (if you want) whether there might be a more suitable option for our club. If you’re happy with these options, I will set up a poll so that we can decide on which schedule to follow.

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#3

Oh I’m really interested but I don’t think I will join - just lurking! I’m only around N3 level so this will be way beyond me, and I’m not sure if I have the willpower to struggle through 30 pages per week of a book. :sweat_smile: Nice choice of literature though! Love a good mystery :blush:

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#4

Oh don’t underestimate your skills :blush: I only started to study N2 grammar a few months ago, but I was able to read the book club’s previous mystery novels (Yougisha X or The Perfect Insider, for example) quite okay. This one might be a tad harder though, because it’s older :woman_shrugging:

Lurking is fine of course! :hugs: But if you’re curious you could have a look at the nomination post and its sample pages in the Advanced Book Club, just to get a feel for what it means to read such a book.

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#5

Thanks for the schedule proposals, and nice job on writing that program! I would rather go for a 7 week schedule. Any of the 7 week proposals are fine by me.

3 Likes
#6

You’re right, I should have put up a poll straight away :woman_facepalming:

Which schedule options do you all prefer?

  • 7 Weeks (optimal)
  • 7 Weeks (slow start)
  • 7 Weeks (slower start)
  • 8 Weeks (optimal)
  • 8 Weeks (slow start)
  • Other (please explain)

0 voters

1 Like
#7

Just pinging everybody who voted in the main polls for this book:
@Natsuha @Hijiki @Naphthalene @Shigurette @Redglare @rodan

If you’d like to vote in the poll for which schedule to read the book at, the stage is yours :tada:
(in the post above this one)

3 Likes
#8

I already started the book to get a headstart. All other readers are probably much faster reading than me and I don’t want to fall behind too much.

5 Likes
#9

OK, basically everybody voted for the 7 weeks optimal schedule, so that’s what we’ll follow. I’ll update the OP in a minute.

(I hope that’s ok for you @wifflebatknight ? If you’re in doubt whether you can catch up with the reading speed, please feel free to start earlier or trail behind a little bit)

3 Likes
#10

Happy New Year everybody! Let’s start the year by reading the first week of our 本陣 murder case :slight_smile:

4 Likes
#11

On to week 2!

2 Likes
#12

Here is week 3:

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