Eh, I think that there are so many past ABBC picks to choose from that it’s a better idea to just advise people to read more of those before continuing on to the BBC.
Absolute Beginners Book Club // Now Reading: My Love Story! // Reading Next (Dec 13th): Gal and Dino
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Selectable text and faster look up tools help with that. Just a LN or children’s book in Bookwalker with Google Translate can work, even if it might not be so accurate. I haven’t set up Mokuro. At some point, I find contextual Kanji studies helpful, not just vocabularies.
Anyway, I can get away more with voicing out in my head, but unreadable characters, or groups of characters, make it hard and worrying.
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They shorten the look-up time, but it still means I’m having to look it up every single time. With furigana, I don’t have to look things up a third, fourth, fifth time. Even if every repeated lookup is quick, I feel like I’m learning less, and I’m not reading it as fluently as I would with furigana.
(Using tools like Yomichan and Mokuro is my default way of reading. I still prefer furigana by a lot!)
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I’m in good company, I see 
Having furigana does help a lot. I might not remember the kanji for a word, but I’ll often remember the reading, especially if it’s a common word. (like an “ooooOOh right, that’s how you write 不思議” type thing)
Also definitely in the camp of ABBC should keep full furigana though. I remember still being pretty intimidated by my first BBC pick without furigana, and that was after I’d probably already read 20 volumes of manga. Learning to be able to look up kanji can be a hurdle on top of all the other hurdles that early reading requires
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This is the crux of it for me, too. Plus, about a quarter of readers tend to get the physical version, and kanji lookups take longer in that case!
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cough cough
I just wanted to give everybody extra time to fill the last nomination slots. 
No, in truth, ended up a little busy and distracted last night and didn’t get a good opportunity to get the selection poll up. I’m working on getting that in now, and we’ll run the poll until (roughly) 2023-10-22T23:00:00Z!
Sorry about the delay, everybody. Look forward to seeing how the votes shake out!
Also, just a reminder, this is my final time running the poll. If anybody is interested in taking on the role, please let me know!
The role involves:
- Organizing the polls for the next book - to be completed 6 weeks before the next book is due to start
- Ensuring a volunteer is allocated to run each book (you don’t have to run them all yourself!)
- Asking for nominations for new books in the week or two leading up to the poll
- Making sure nominations are made using the standard format (we will likely be removing the difficulty poll requirement and subbing in a Natively requirement)
- Ensuring the opening post of this thread is kept up to date. Also update the Master List of Book Clubs on what we are planning to read.
- Updating the title of this thread (or asking a regular who has permission to do this), in particular to highlight when we are seeking nominations or undertaking a poll.
- Addressing any issues that come up (e.g. is a nominated book too difficult for ABBC) either by leading discussion with book club members, creating a poll, or occasionally just making an executive decision!
I’ll also still be around to answer any questions (and would also gladly give my Discord to whomever takes over so you can reach me directly, if need be).
Anyhow! I’ll get the selection poll up here shortly!
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TBH, most of this sounds like it could be automated away using a script. Especially the parts about updating the threads.
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Only concern with updating the threads being automated is there does need to be a human hand involved for cases where we determine a book isn’t a fit for the club and such, but yeah, a lot of this could very much be automated. (I’m just not going to spend the time to write the script personally. 
)
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Oh yeah, the discussion part, I don’t think we are at that point with chatbots, that they could create topics for that 
I mainly meant the thread title, upcoming books, links to book clubs, and maybe could even notify you, that the time has come to poll
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It’s Time To Vote For The Next Book!
If you are interested in reading along with the Absolute Beginner Book Club, then please feel free to vote in this poll!
The list of options is below. The titles are hyperlinked to their respective nomination posts, which contains more information about the book as well as some sample pages.
The difficulty rating is based on feedback from folks looking at those sample pages, and so is very approximate! A score of 3 is considered to be “just right” for the club, with higher scores being a touch more difficult, and lower scores being easier, but since it is approximate, keep in mind that the scores may not be exact!
You have up to 5 votes, which can be changed up until the poll closes. I will keep the poll open until 2023-10-22T23:00:00Z, one week from now.
The intended start date for the next book is December 16th 2023.
| Book Title | Description | Difficulty Rating |
|---|---|---|
| こぐまのクーク物語 春と夏 | Kuuku the Bear Cub’s Story, Spring and Summer | 2.9 |
| 日本の昔ばなし | Japanese Folk Tales Collection Vol 1 (Issun-boshi and other stories) | 2.4 |
| もしかしたら名探偵 | Detective Milky Sugiyama | 2.4 |
| １０分で読めるこわい話1年生 | 10 minute reader - Scary stories (1st grade reader) | 3.0 |
Manga
| Manga Title | Description | Difficulty Rating |
|---|---|---|
| こばと | Kobato | 3.5 |
| あしょんでよッ ~うちの犬ログ | Let’s Plaaay - Our Dog, Log | 2.6 |
| 可愛いだけじゃない式守さん | Miss Shikimori is not just cute | 2.9 |
| 藤本タツキ短編集 17-21 | Fujimoto Tatsuki Short Story Collection 17-21 | 2.3 |
| ふだつきのキョーコちゃん | Fudatsuki no Kyoko-chan | 2.4 |
| ギャルと恐竜 | Gal & Dino | 2.5 |
| クリスタルハンタース | Crystal Hunters | 2.5 |
| 今日から始める幼なじみ | Will you be my childhood friend? | 2.8 |
| ガールズ＆パンツァー リトルアーミー | Girls und Panzer: Little Army | 2.5 * |
| ネトゲの嫁が人気アイドルだった | My wife in an online game is a popular idol | 3.0 * |
| 花野井くんと恋の病 | A Condition Called Love | |
| 桜井さんは気づいてほしい | Sakurai-san wants to be noticed! | |
| ドラえもん | Doraemon | |
| 玉藻の恋 | Tamamo no Koi |
Book Poll 11
- [Book] Kuuku the Bear Cub’s Story, Spring and Summer (2.9)
- [Book] Japanese Folk Tales Collection Vol 1 (Issun-boshi and other stories) (2.4)
- [Book] Detective Milky Sugiyama (2.4)
- [Book] 10 Minute Reader - Scary Stories (1st Grade Reader) (3.0)
- [Manga] Kobato (3.5)
- [Manga] Let’s Plaaay - Our Dog, Log (2.6)
- [Manga] Miss Shikimori is Not Just Cute (2.9)
- [Manga] Fujimoto Tatsuki Short Story Collection 17-21 (2.3)
- [Manga] Fudatsuki no Kyoko-chan (2.4)
- [Manga] Gal & Dino (2.5)
- [Manga] Crystal Hunters
- [Manga] Will you be my childhood friend?
- [Manga] Girls und Panzer: Little Army
- [Manga] My wife in an online game is an idol
- [Manga] A Condition Called Love
- [Manga] Sakurai-san wants to be noticed!
- [Manga] Doraemon
- [Manga] Tamamo no Koi
0
voters
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I wouldn’t mind taking over running this thread. I’m not sure about running the books myself, but I suppose I could if I learned how to generate those vocab sheets.
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Running the books themselves is not part of the job description. That’s (usually) up to the person nominating the book, or, if they aren’t available, someone willing to take that up. Also, vocab sheet generation is very new, not mandatory, and it’s actually usually done by ChristopherFritz right now I believe.
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Lol whew. Yeah, I could take over this thread, then.
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@anon99047008 sooo, when are we doing the vote reset, just as a final sendoff? Should we make sure it happens as close to the end of the poll as possible?
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I think @anon99047008 would be super happy if we could get a tie (even better if it’s three-way) to make that last poll extra special and exciting. 
Maybe we could even make the “deciding” second poll afterwards a tie too!
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Masterful plan to keep him as our ABBC thread master for forever, very well made.
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I’m gone for a little while to be with my other half, and y’all start plotting on ways to keep me here. It’s like the opposite of a coup. 
Perfect! I very much appreciate it. I’ll finish up this round of voting and everything, but the next round will be up to you, then! Thank you so much.
As mentioned, if you have questions or anything, feel free to ask me, and if need be, I can send you my Discord info.
[Details=Aside]
@Jiell I have not seen you in ages! So good to see you around again!
[/details]
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You lot really are conspiring to keep me more active here, aren’t you?
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MrGeneric isn’t just a cutie
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Speaking of vocabulary sheets, I’ve switched from using Juman++ to Ichiran. The latter does not split expressions into individual words.
Personally, I find this to be an improvement, but I don’t use the vocabulary sheets myself to know if it’s common or uncommon to have expressions in the sheet.
For example, consider 「涙を流す」.
Juman++ splits this into:
- 涙
- を
- 流す
I would then filter out particles and match up with Wiktionary entries for English:
- 涙 — なみだ — tears
- 流す — ながす — to flow; to release; to cancel
Using Ichiran, this parses out as an expression:
- 涙を流す — なみだをながす — to shed tears
(But my Juman++ process is still available to use if splitting expressions out into their individual words is preferred.)
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