Sorry I had a pretty hectic day and I completely forgot about making the weekly thread. I’ll do it in a few hours when I return home.
xoxo
Here we go, 2nd-to-last week:
Anyone interested in continuing the book club to read all four volumes?
I considered it but I think I’m already committing to too many clubs as it is. I think I’ll want to finish the series eventually but maybe only in a little while when I’m more proficient and able to read this type of content faster.
Compared to Atelier it’s a significant challenge for me, it takes a conscious effort for me to power through each chapter, and I usually only read half a chapter at a time before taking a break. I wonder how Full Metal Alchemist will compare, it’s supposed to be slightly harder than this according to Natively but I find it hard to believe at this point.
I must also say that I’m slightly off-put by the fan-service content given how young these girls are. It’s not too bad but I could do without the 14yo in bikinis for no reason for instance…
Yeah I’ll circle around back to this when I feel more confident I reckon. I enjoy the setting and different vocab but it’s quite a challenge still.
Book club is a nice way of getting a safe taste and gauging your own ability, and this is still a bit in the ‘effort’ camp and right now I’m still using that brainpower for ダン飯
Possibly but probably not. I’m quite behind but can probably catch up, however don’t think I can continue an offshoot at the current club pace. I need to see if this draws me in a bit more first.
Ah, alright. I’m not going to reread it on my own since I did just finish the series a few months ago. If you all decide to continue as a group in the future let me know.
I guess if several of you are finding the manga challenging but manageable, the club is doing its job.
That’s certainly true, the level of difficulty here is more what I would have expected from an IMC (compared to Atelier which I enjoy a lot but is comparatively a lot less challenging).
I think I do have a slight bias against 4koma after this book though, as discussed in previous weeks I really think that the rigid structure forces the mangaka to make confusing choices sometimes which compound with the difficulty of the text.
I’ll still vote for Bocchi though for contractual reasons.
I think it’s on the upper end of intermediate, but definitely not advanced. While it is the 8th most difficult manga I’ve read according to Natively, some are waaay harder.
Sorry to hear that. 
I really love the format for comedies.
Which is about the same difficulty as 紡ぐ乙女と大正の月, but in some ways it’s worse because it has that difficulty despite the modern setting.
I’ll read at least the next two volumes because I own them, but when depends a bit on the ending of volume 1. 
it’s this and text density i think. I’m ‘used’ to reading 4koma so it’s not so bad now (certainly it’s so much easier than when I started reading 4komas with Bocchi) but if I think about DanMeshi, which is a bit higher level than this [by the Natively count], DanMeshi has two major advantages which is the way stuff is laid out feels a lot easier to follow, and there’s also pages of action sequences with very little dialogue or much easier to follow stuff since it’s mostly very ‘physical’ dialogue (いけ、しまった、くそ etc). 4koma by comparison is very wordy, and also very often comedy, which adds another layer of complexity too.
That said, I’m glad I find it a lot easier than Bocchi when I started that! I’m definitely improving and this is a nice boost.
Monthly Girls’ Nozaki-kun is the only 4-koma series I’ve read multiple volumes of. It always delivers a punchline and the humor is consistently funny. On the other hand, reading 紡ぐ乙女と大正の月 feels like more of a task. In my opinion, its historical setting and references are its only saving graces. Perhaps I’m missing something that others find appealing.
I think it has its moments but it’s definitely not a genre I would usually consume, which makes it somewhat more interesting to me. These book clubs give me an opportunity to engage with content outside of my usual comfort zone.
I found the latest chapters quite enjoyable overall, the character dynamics have been established and the back-and-forth between the 4 girls is generally entertaining, although it still lacks a bit of a proper intrigue to make it all more cohesive. I only read a little bit of Bocchi and it felt a lot more plot-driven than this.
And the finish line (for volume 1) is here: