[2022] 多読/extensive reading challenge

Japanese Language Reading
#1422

Just finished Persona 5: Scramble! All told it took me 75 hours, 23 minutes – I literally finished the game three minutes faster than a native speaker I follow on Twitter. Compare that to the 250 hours it took me to beat Persona Q2 just a year ago!

I was really happy with my pace the whole way through. Voiced dialogue gave me basically no trouble and I barely had to look up any words outside of some formal business scenes (and the climactic battle against God of course).

It’s a super good game and if you have a handle on N2 grammar (with a few N1 constructions here and there) I highly recommend it.

…now to catch up on 39 pages from the book club :cold_sweat:

12 Likes
#1423

Finished volume 4. It was nice to get a new character who isn’t somehow a potential love interest of the main character.
Reading itself was weird. I finished most of the main story (180/210 pages) in one sitting. Then read the remaining 30 pages to be met with an unexpectedly early epilogue. It turns out that the last ~100 pages of the book were short stories. I somehow read a couple sentences of the first story, noticed it happened in the past (a few days before Bell’s level up) and just put the book down. Somehow, things that happened in the past do not really catch my interest in general… after all, it already happened, so it’s not going to have any impact on the main story. So, despite an early rush, it still took me almost one week overall to slog through the book overall. The stories were okay in the end, it’s just that they felt like a distraction from what is otherwise happening. I wish they had put them in order, though I realize that it would have made the editing a bit messy. :thinking:

7 Likes
#1424

Finished Wの悲劇! It took 26 days, which is fine with me, but is especially fine because I read a ton of manga during that time as well. Now I’m behind on book club stuff because the end of my book was compelling my attention, but it was worth it. I enjoyed the book a lot, and though I hadn’t been sure I would up until then, I found the ending very satisfying.

Last time I felt wishy-washy about choosing a new book but managed it, but this time maybe instead of dithering about it I’ll just do a poll today and get the decision out of my hands. I still have the ones I narrowed it down to last time, and I’m feeling very lethargic with self-isolation etc. (I have more time to read right now but I’m pretty sure I’m actually reading a bit less because I’m so droopy and out of it.)

4 Likes
#1425

I know what you mean! I really like the Stormlight Archive books, but the interspersed flashback chapters are a total drag.

3 Likes
#1426

Same. :confused:

5 Likes
#1427

Finished 台所のドラゴンvol 3 and I still love it.

The faery people paid another visit and some normal people are starting to notice a dragon flying around. :star:

3 Likes
#1428

Well that looks adorable. Is it a manga, or a book?

2 Likes
#1429

Pixiv コミック. (Though for reasons not clear to me, chapters 6-8 are missing.)

1 Like
#1430

It’s a manga and it is adorable. I highly recommend it. I originally picked up the first book on a whim at Culcos (カルコス - I had no idea it was spelled that way in English until now) years ago and fell in love with it. It’s like the middle schooler me’s dragon dream manga and makes the dog story loving adult me melt.

7 Likes
#1431

I’m sold :joy:

2 Likes
#1432

@Belthazar Just wanted to let you know that your weighing of your manga volumes helped me a lot. I also had to figure out the volume of my collection so I could buy the right size boxes. I’m sure I didn’t do that in the most efficient way, but hey, it worked.

Now my collection is all in boxes (except for those going in my suitcases) and tomorrow they will start their journey to Sweden. ^^

6 Likes
#1433

Out of curiosity (and assuming you didn’t play on the Switch), did you go for the platinum? And if you did, how long did it take you to max all of your Band skills?

#1434

I played on Switch, yeah. I haven’t touched the post-game content yet but I don’t know if I’m looking forward to that grind haha.

#1435

Ah, alright. Thanks for the reply, and congrats on finishing the game so quickly :slightly_smiling_face:

1 Like
#1436

All right, please help me choose what book to read next. These are all books I want to read at some point, so feel free to choose for any reason, no matter how whimsical. Three of them (狐火の家, 死神の浮力, とらドラ) are sequels to books I’ve already read. The last option links to my 積読 page on Bookmeter. Help me, Obi-Wanikani.

0 voters

3 Likes
#1437

Whoa. Pie-chart poll. Since when was that a thing?

3 Likes
#1438

I voted for 雷の季節の終わりに because the title is awesome (and someone else I follow on Bookmeter read it and liked it).

All You Need Is Kill is probably also a good choice, since the movie is one of the only good American adaptions of Japanese media I’ve ever seen.

空ろの箱と零のマリア also might be good. It’s one of the highest rated light novel series among Western audiences based on MAL and AniList, but it has more mixed reviews in Japan (based on the Amazon reviews). I’m planning to start the series in the next few months, so if you don’t read it now/soon I’ll let you know how I like it.

Maybe 2-3 months now I think.

2 Likes
#1439

I don’t know any of the books, so my vote is actually a recommendation of a Japanese friend who said とらドラ is very interesting - hope this helps :wink:

1 Like
#1440

That’s interesting about the different reactions to 空ろの箱と零のマリア. I’m probably not going to start it soon, but I look forward to hearing what you think about it!

1 Like
#1441

So I mixed up the days that 君の名は was due, so I actually returned it a day late and wasn’t able to extend my rental because of that :sweat_smile: got busier than I expected towards the end of the school closures and wasn’t able to finish it, maybe I’ll just buy it and then finish it at home? Idk, but I’m a completionist so I’m leaving it under books read until I actually finish it.

Decided to take a bit of a step down to some easier books again to relax, but they STILL don’t have volume 4 of 銭天堂 I’m so I got 5 and 6 instead since the stories are unrelated, and I’ll order volume 4 later to go back and read.

5 Likes