That Skip Beat novel / collection of short stories 
Definitely want to read that one day, too!
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There’s also a fanbook, which is pretty good. “Stats” for each character, a mini interview with them, some color illustrations, interview with the mangaka, a small manga one shot (set during Kyoko’s/Maria’s bday party), and I think an interview with some of the seiyuu for the anime? (Been a while since I cracked it open.) Definitely a must have if you enjoy the series.
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I actually owned but sold it a few days back 
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I haven’t read too much of it, so take this as more of a hint than a suggestion – but I quite enjoyed what I’ve read of あさひなぐ. All-female cast, no fanservice from what I can remember (maybe some light locker room stuff but I might be imagining that), and it’s about 薙刀 which was completely new to me. The first volume has kind of an “appetizer” tournament that’s meant to send off the third-year team members while introducing the rules of the sport, which I thought was a cool framing device.
The first few volumes tend to go up for free on Honto and such every now and then so you could probably wait to grab it – apparently the final volume actually releases on 9/30, so the odds are good that they’ll give a few away within the next few days.
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I just finished the 3rd volume of 本好き and it was amazing. Things are finally starting to fall into place. (I’ll probably keep additional comments for the relevant thread).
Mostly, I read it as fast as I physically could (I just couldn’t stop). That’s one of the good bad neutral points of digital books: since I never really have to put down the book, I don’t get the cost of starting to read again, which in turns mean that I never have the opportunity to start reading (or doing) something else. I didn’t see much of an impact on my life when I was reading 乙女ゲーム[…] since the books were over in 2~3 days, without particular cliffhangers, so I regularly had time to do something else. However, 本好き keeps stopping where I don’t want it to stop, so I end up starting the next book by accident, and the cycle repeats. I thought that it would stop with volume 3, since it’s the end of arc 1… But of course not.
By the way, it took me 4 days and a half to finish the 3rd book, so I was wondering why I was so slow despite giving it my all… but it turns out that it was more than 450 pages long, so I was reading 100 pages per day on average 
Not having any idea of the length of books is a weird feeling.
Anyway onward to book 4 wait I am late on book clubs again nnnn just one more book week.
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I’m happy to hear the first arc was really good. Now I’m even more excited to keep reading! I’ve been looking for a while now for a series to be the core of my Japanese book reading, but my previous attempts (魔法少女育成計画 and 空ろの箱と零のマリア) didn’t work out because of difficulty and quality respectively. 本好き has been great in terms of both quality (interesting premise, story flows well, good writing quality) and difficulty (easy enough to get through pain-free, while still learning a lot of new words)
I think I’ll make it a goal to finish the first three books by end of year, and anything else can be a bonus. Of course, the second and third books combined are 2.4 times longer than the first book, so even that may be pushing it slightly since I still want to study the words I’m encountering. But I might as well try. Guess this means I’m not bothering with 博士の愛した数式 for now though, since I don’t want to read three Japanese books at the same time. Maybe I’ll read that after I finish the first arc of 本好き or after I finish book 2 of 獣の奏者.
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Oh, this sounds good, too! I’ve actually seen the live-action movie of this, but somehow it didn’t occur to me to read the manga. Thank you! <3
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Oh neat, first I’ve heard of that! I’ll have to check it out too.
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Any excuse for a poll! 25 is the max number of options, right? (eta: it’s 20 and I had to get rid of some, harrumph) I tried to put this behind a cut but discourse thwarted me. I will probably start ~3 new series but (hopefully) allowed 5 choices. I tried to make sure there are ebooks or near-me library books for all of these, so I should be able to try any of them.
- 2DK、Gペン、目覚まし時計。
- Bamboo Blade
- SPYxFAMILY
- あさひなぐ
- あずまんが大王
- からかい上手の高木さん
- コミンカビヨリ
- しろくまカフェ
- とんがり帽子のアトリエ
- ブルーサーマル
- やがて君になる
- 不完全な人の為に
- 天は赤い河のほとり
- 将棋指す獣
- 旦那が何を言っているかわからない件
- 桜蘭高校ホスト部
- 椎名くんの鳥獣百科
- 猫とふたりの鎌倉手帖
- 繕い裁つ人
- 魔法少女まどか★マギカ
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(I had options for ‘You could focus on the manga you’re reading now?’ and ‘You could spend more time reading novels?’ but had to make space, so if you want to call me out like that you’ll have to write it out yourself~)
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For Madoka Magica, definitely watch the anime instead of reading the manga, as that’s the original form.
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I’ve got a question for you voracious readers! I’ve got a coupon on Bookwalker for 90% off select books the info. Are any of these ones you’d recommend I pick up while they were so cheap? (I especially wanna know the ones you think would be good even at full price)
Oh, good to know, thank you!
Missing option:
“Read the ones on the list that I recognize and liked, and skip the ones I’ve never heard of or didn’t like.”
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Ah, but now I’m curious! Which ones didn’t you care for, if you’re willing to say?
Nothing specific to your list. It’s just what I think whenever I see a “what should I read next” poll. I look for any that I’ve even heard of/read/watched, and then think, “Would I even recommend it or not”? =P
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What else can you do, really? Luckily polls aren’t binding. 
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I only voted for Bamboo Blade because it was just recently nominated and I found it interesting. The neko one I don’t know but everything with cat involved in it deserves a vote!
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SPYxFAMILY is hysterical so if you haven’t read that yet then I HIGHLY recommend it.
Also, as the prophecy foretold: first five volumes of あさひなぐ for free on cmoa to commemorate the series finale.
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@frayderike The neko one has five cats and they all appear to be full of personality, so I look forward to trying that.
@jacobalbano Ahhh, I just finished the first volume last night and it made me laugh so much!! I really liked that even as it made me laugh, it didn’t do it in a callous way–the way the characters are starting to relate to each other is really interesting already~ Thank you for the heads-up about あさひなぐ as well! <3
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I decided I also had way too many manga in progress, so I’m trying to wrap some up before moving onto new series.
- I just finished ストロベリー・フィールズをもう一度. I didn’t care for the first volume much, but it got better with the second and third volumes. There was actually plot!
- Next I’m reading the last volume of にじいろフォトグラフ.
- Then I’ll probably read the last two volumes of 徒然日和.
- All the while I’ll be reading volumes 5 and 6 of こみっくがーるず as my one 4-koma. The series is ongoing, but those are the last volumes published so far. I honestly was holding off on reading these volumes because I really like the series and didn’t want to catch up too quickly. But it was time, and the first three chapters of volume 5 already reminded me of why I like the series so much.
Not sure what I’ll do after that, but those should last me at least a few weeks depending on how much I’m reading actual books and watching anime.
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