I put no break, but would be happy enough with a short break (ie a week or two so that anyone a bit behind has a chance to catch up) - I just don’t think I’d have the self control not to just read on if the break was significant!
To be honest, I have no reason to believe the break would NOT be significant
After all, it’s about getting readers to buy the second book as well, innit?
I think we can decide this on short notice (i.e. when the first persons have finished the final week’s reading, which shouldn’t take too long as it is only one chapter iirc).
For the schedule of the second volume, I checked out the book and it is of similar length and contains 26 chapters (#24 - #49). Currently I am way too lazy to come up with a detailed schedule - would you all be ok with just continuing to read two chapters per week? I think Murakami writes chapters of pretty equal length so I’m expecting this to work out more or less okay. (If you definitely need a more detailed schedule, then please nudge me and I will work it out.)
Given the intensity of our discussions here and the amount of readers who want to continue, I will just continue with one thread per week if that’s okay.
Haha woops I think this was my bad/vague phrasing. I meant significant in terms of time - like if we set it to start in a month or two rather than a shorter break then it would be more difficult to resist just reading on.
But the plan you’ve suggested sounds good! If it happens that a week for some reason has some obnoxiously long chapter or a really significant ramp up in difficulty then I’m sure we can just discuss and arrange any updates to the schedule in the threads.
I’m sure we can just discuss and arrange any updates to the schedule in the threads.
That was my thinking as well! Let’s roll with that, then, for the time being. Next week or so I will update the OP and add the new weeks as off-shoot reading.
With this week, we are back to our usual rhythm of two chapters per week:
Join the Advanced Book Club here! 海辺のカフカ - Kafka on the Shore Home Thread Week 9 [image] Start Date: July 23rd Previous Part: Week 8 Next Part: Week 10 Reading: Week Start Date Chapters Page Count Week 9 July 23rd 17, 18 44 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 r…
Here is week #10, now it’s not far until we finish the first part of this book!
Join the Advanced Book Club here! 海辺のカフカ - Kafka on the Shore Home Thread Week 10 [image] Start Date: July 30th Previous Part: Week 9 Next Part: Week 11 Reading: Week Start Date Chapters Page Count Week 10 July 30th 19, 20 51 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…
Quick heads up: Next week I will only be able to set up the new thread on Sunday evening (travelling once again without computer, for very different reasons but still ).
I guess y’all know what to do in the meantime
Thanks everybody for your patience once again! Here is the thread for our penultimate week:
Join the Advanced Book Club here! 海辺のカフカ - Kafka on the Shore Home Thread Week 11 [image] Start Date: Aug 6th Previous Part: Week 10 Next Part: Week 12 Reading: Week Start Date Chapters Page Count Week 11 Aug 6th 21, 22 46 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 re…
The end of the book is drawing near, and we should decide when to continue with the second part of the book. This week we’ve seen the last Nakata chapter of this part, and there will be one more upcoming Kafka chapter (if everything continues as before). So I guess we can already start to gauge how much of a cliffhanger this division will bring about…
- Let’s continue straight away (on Aug 20th)
- I need a one week break (on Aug 27th)
- There is no other option (or is there? Pls explain)
0 voters
I’m already finished with Volume 1 and waiting to start Volume 2.
Now that was easy Let’s continue on August 20th, then!
And here it finally is: Our last week in this book club!
Join the Advanced Book Club here! 海辺のカフカ - Kafka on the Shore Home Thread Week 12 [image] Start Date: Aug 13th Previous Part: Week 11 Reading: Week Start Date Chapters Page Count Week 12 Aug 13th 23 28 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 …
For those of you who are planning to continue into Part 2: I’ve added a reading schedule to the OP.
When I finally got around to checking the page counts, I discovered that there are quite a bunch of shorter chapters in this part, and when I realized that the initial plan of reading 2 chapters per week might only give us ~25 pages sometimes, I decided to change the schedule somewhat. Please have a look at my proposal in the OP; it usually gives us max. 50 pages per week, with two weeks being a bit longer (but they are surrounded by shorter weeks so you can mitigate this if you are worried). The schedule covers 11 weeks and gets us to the end of the whole book on Nov 4th. (BTW I think this is perfect timing; the next ABC pick after Spice and Wolf will start on Nov 5th.)
What do y’all think?
- The schedule is fine for me
- I’d like to propose a change to the schedule (please explain)
0 voters
Oh and by the way, while doing the page counts I discovered that there is a (very short) hidden chapter somewhere in the book, just like an easter egg I deliberately did not indicate it in the schedule so that you can still be surprised by it if you like
Now that we successfully finished Part 1, it is…
Satisfaction Poll Time!
Have you read 海辺のカフカ(上)?
- I finished it
- I’m still reading and I plan on finishing it
- I don’t plan to finish it
- I never even started it
0 voters
If you read the book, how would you rate it on a 5 point scale? (1: hated it, 5: loved it)
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- Unsure / Didn’t finish
0 voters
If you read the book, how would you rate its difficulty?
- No effort at all
- Minimal effort
- Moderate effort
- Significant effort
- So much effort my head might explode
- I don’t know
0 voters
Participation Statistics
After the first few weeks, we had a very steady number of participants! Also there were two discussion spikes, one after the Johnny Walker chapter and one after the chapter with the visiting ladies and the Oshima reveal - not surprising that they both induced some more discussion…
And without further ado, let’s jump into Part 2!
This week we have 2 chapters on our plate:
Join the Advanced Book Club here! 海辺のカフカ - Kafka on the Shore Home Thread Week 13 [image] Start Date: Aug 20 Next Part: Week 14 Reading: Week Start Date Chapters Page Count Week 13 Aug 20 24, 25 47 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 …
Here is week 14, the second week of Part 2!
This week (and next week as well) we’ll be reading 3 chapters, so don’t stop early please
Join the Advanced Book Club here! 海辺のカフカ - Kafka on the Shore Home Thread Week 14 [image] Start Date: Aug 27 Previous Part: Week 13 Next Part: Week 15 Reading: Week Start Date Chapters Page Count Week 14 Aug 27 26, 27, 28 50 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 …
Still on week 13; have to do some catching up. I actually started learning Chinese on a whim this week and now I just can’t stop! It’s taking a chunk of my reading time for Japanese but it’s quite refreshing (Du Chinese reading app is addicting). Makes me appreciate all the progress made when I switch back to Japanese .
Belated question: Did anyone finish reading Part 1 and decide NOT to continue reading with Part 2? Just curious…
Welcome to Week 15! This week we’ll see 3 chapters again, don’t forget to read them all
Join the Advanced Book Club here! 海辺のカフカ - Kafka on the Shore Home Thread Week 15 [image] Start Date: Sep 03 Previous Part: Week 14 Next Part: Week 16 Reading: Week Start Date Chapters Page Count Week 15 Sep 03 29, 30, 31 54 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 …
Sorry for the delay! I was super busy in the past week, and yesterday I went to bed so early that I totally forgot to post the threads
Anyways, this week we are back to 2 chapters! Enjoy
Join the Advanced Book Club here! 海辺のカフカ - Kafka on the Shore Home Thread Week 16 [image] Start Date: Sep 10 Previous Part: Week 15 Next Part: Week 17 Reading: Week Start Date Chapters Page Count Week 16 Sep 10 32, 33 45 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 read…
On to week 17! Again, we have two chapters this week.
Join the Advanced Book Club here! 海辺のカフカ - Kafka on the Shore Home Thread Week 17 [image] Start Date: Sep 17 Previous Part: Week 16 Next Part: Week 18 Reading: Week Start Date Chapters Page Count Week 17 Sep 17 34, 35 36 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 read…