Wow, it’s also excellently rated at Natively. 4.83/5 from 12 reviews?!
To be honest… I’m not quite sure how “titles hanging out in the nomination cycle for years on end” is a problem and why this was necessary. The club already has a mechanism for removing nominations, and we were far below the limit of 20.
I think books should stay nominated unless they get removed by the normal mechanism or because there’s a problem with them now, like “The Fujimoto Tatsuki collection is Natively L23, which is above the level for this club”.
edit:
Checking the last poll - you just removed the nominations that were on third and fourth place, so there’s a lot of interest too.
Sure, the reasoning is mostly that when book nominations are several years old, the original nominator is usually no longer active. I can’t ask those people to run the club for the book if it wins. Since re-nominations are allowed, that ensures that whoever nominates it again is excited about the book and can run the book’s club threads.
Removing old books from the polls also ensures that if someone did want to read them, they could do so on their own without feeling like they should wait on the club.
I’d have to check the other polls for the short story collection, but Gal and Dino has been on the verge of removal from low interest several times as well.
I want to re-nominate Kobato, I am wondering if I need to make a new nomination post or if the one from a few years back with all the info still stands.
I still feel it’s unnecessary and should not have happened, and I’m not convinced it’s actually solving any problems. I feel like things like this could be briefly talked about and at least voted on before they happen.
But I also don’t want to argue, I’m not that invested in the ABBC at the moment and I’m thankful that you’re taking your time to organize the club.
That may be true, I got kind of excited about cleaning out the old nominations and went ahead with it I can still run a poll if people are actually that opposed to the idea, but I don’t think keeping the nominations fresh is a bad thing. This book club has a lot of turnover in members/participants and there’s no guarantee that someone who wants to read with the club now will still be interested in it in a few years!
The old post doesn’t match the nomination format, so I would prefer a new post following the format! Also, feel free to write what you personally like about the book and are interested in, that helps a lot with drumming up new interest!
Oh no the adorable puppy story is gone ; -;
…maybe that means I should propose that adorable kitty story instead :b
I don’t know if there’s many people fan of these kind of stories here though, I recall not many people voting for the one that just got cleaned up, there’s a reason it happened.
A sweetly comedic manga about a cat who cooks, cleans, and succeeds at adulting more than the woman who expected him to be a pet!
Saku is an ordinary young woman who works long hours and lives alone with her cat, Yukichi. Yukichi, however, is not an ordinary house cat. For one, the temperamental feline towers over Saku and walks around on two legs. Instead of playing with toy mice, he scours supermarket flyers for good deals and keeps the house spotless. With a pet like that, it’s hard to tell who’s taking care of who!
I came across the English version of this manga and thought it looked like a good level for beginners! It’s episodic, and is comedic slice of life with no romance, and a cat! The first 3 pages are actually a bit more wordy than the rest of the book. Overall it seems to be text light.
Tina and her brother Nicholas live in a cozy little village in Finland. Together, they run a soup shop that is very popular among the locals. One day, Nicholas sees a dandelion floating near the window of their house. Upon grabbing hold of it, he locks it in a jar. Unexpectedly, the flower transforms into a cute little being! The siblings melt in its presence, and they immedietally adopt it.
Dressed in a small sweater that was knitted for him, Kesaran becomes a member a member of their family, and he will live plenty of adventures, each one funnier than the next. He will even help the siblings make new recipes as a small chef.
This was the second or third manga that I ever read in Japanese. Most pages have anywhere from one to four sentences, it’s fairly non-intimidating as a first manga. It’s set in northern Europe (I think Finland) so it’s a break from the typical Japanese setting. It also takes place in a soup shop, very fitting for this time of year.
OMG perfect christmas / Winter timing on this one, HOW DO I VOTE.
Also YES on the change of setting, I CANNOT read more mangas with japanese school settings
I’ve only read volume one but yes it’s perfect for colder weather, scarves and soup and hot chocolate by the fire! Voting time will come soon, I promise.
Let me take this chance to point out that 薫る花は凛と咲く currently has an anime hype train
My thoughts on removing older nominations
I think those nominations would benefit from being removed for now, and maybe renominated after one or two rounds. That would make them shiny and new again. Maybe if those series get an anime hype train, or a new review or user to hype it up.
The biggest con I see is that we had so few nominations anyway, and now we have even less. So everyone go nominate something RIGHT NOW!
Yeah, I’m in favor of renominations. If someone is genuinely excited to read something, so they re-nominate something and hype it up, I think that would actually give it more of a chance of winning than just hanging out in the middle of the polls for several years and becoming stale. Maybe we can think of the nomination removals as more of a ‘time out’ than ‘dead forever’
Btw, just a note on that - I think almost nobody who nominates for the ABBC is in the target new reader audience. A lot of new readers are new in the community, many have never participated in a book club, and they’ll be too busy to try to understand the manga anyway to be able to organize a club at the same time. The people who nominate here are usually more experienced readers who want to help absolute beginners and/or want to spread the love of their favourite low-level mangas.
I’m definitely not saying that because I’d vote for Gal & Dino if you nominate it.
We’ve all been there—a couple drinks too many, and a hazy wander back to your home, where you wake up wondering how you got there. But in Kaede’s case, not only was she not sure how she got home … she wasn’t sure how the dinosaur got there, either! The two are soon fast friends, but though their personalities jive, they’ll have to learn how to communicate in order to live peacefully together!
This series is great! It’s funny, the chapters are short and mostly self contained, so if you miss something in one it shouldn’t be a problem going forward. Kaede is also college aged, which is a nice change from a lot of manga at this level. This isn’t one of those books you read because it’s what’s available to you at your reading level; I found this manga long after I was a beginner and loved it.
Pros and Cons for the Book Club
Pros
Easy read with lots of visual humor
Short chapters
Finished at 7 volumes
Cons
The “Gal” in the title is actually ギャル (gyaru), so there’s some slang from Kaede and her friends.
I can still run a poll if people are actually that opposed to the idea, but I don’t think keeping the nominations fresh is a bad thing. This book club has a lot of turnover in members/participants and there’s no guarantee that someone who wants to read with the club now will still be interested in it in a few years!
Who will win?? 
