Beginner Japanese Book Club // Now Reading: 気になってる人が男じゃなかった // Next 葬送のフリーレン, then ウスズミの果て

I can post in the IBC and BBC threads :slight_smile:

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I believe アオのハコ Blue Box has started on its own, so it should probably be removed from the nominees?

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It looks like a club started at the beginning of the month. Polls can’t be changed after 5 min and even then, all the votes get deleted. It looks like it won’t be a problem for this round of voting though at least.

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Oh no :flushed: I totally missed that :flushed::flushed:

Yes, better not to delete the poll but could be mentioned in the post to not vote for it. And if someone voted for it and sees it, the vote can be changed :slight_smile:

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I have to say, I wasn’t expecting Behind the supermarket, smoking with you to be so popular! I’m expecting it to win based on the current votes, it’s a pleasant surprise. On another note, it’s kind of funny that Kiyo in Kyoto was second on the poll last time, and this time as well :sweat_smile:

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The Girl Who Leapt Through Time came second in about six consecutive polls in the IBC. It went on so long it was starting to turn into a running joke.

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I think you’re misremembering something here considering that 時をかける少女 was read in BBC and won back in the 5th ever poll.

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Yeah, that’s possible. Something came second in some number of consecutive polls in some book club. :stuck_out_tongue:

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That I do remember :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

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Now, this is what I call a close competition. The funny thing is, since Kiyo in Kyoto is a short one, if it won in theory the Behind the Supermarket, Smoking with You would be automatically picked as the next book.

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I suddenly feel that urge to vote for Kiyo :eyes:

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That concludes the vote. The winner is スーパーの裏でヤニ吸うふたり (Behind the Supermarket, Smoking With You) with a narrow lead. We will start reading this manga on the 15th of July.

@snowwater would you be willing to host the club?

This time none of the nominations will be removed (outside of アオのハコ that I forgot about), though there are 2 or 3 that are in danger.

Would a regular be so kind to change the title back to Beginner Japanese Book Club // Now Reading: ロジカとラッカセイ

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Yes, I will create the book club thread later today and post it here :slightly_smiling_face: and hopefully also start the poll for the schedule soon.

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If you’re in the mood for something a little easier, come give your thoughts on what we should read next in the ABBC!

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Nomination post :slight_smile:
Originally posted in the ABBC because it is quite short, but probaly a better fit for the BBC because of the Natively level (25)

雪女 Yuki-onna

Summary

Copying this review from LearnNatively:
Nice little horror-y folktale, only a few pages long. It reminds me of a few other Japanese folktales I’ve read involving mysterious magical women.

Being an Aozora book, some of the usual difficulty caveats apply (e.g. some older kanji usage). Being a folktale set in the countryside, it also has some rustic vocabulary that may be unfamiliar if, like me, you mostly read more contemporary works. However, the grammar is not very complicated, and the longer sentences are broken up with punctuation.

Availability

  • Physical:
    ** Print the free version

  • Audio:
    ** On youtube

  • Caution, those versions are different than the one in Aozora:
    ** Not free: AmazonJP, several stories + furigana
    ** Not free: AmazonUS (The physical copy comes with an audio CD, but the files can also be listened to and/or downloaded for free on their website (which of course is different from the Aozora version, but they can be used for audio practice regardless))

Personal Opinion

I want to read this book because I have never yet read a book in Japanese, only manga.
I went on Natively to try and find a short story and found this one as the most popular one that wasn’t yet read on WK (unless I missed it), level 25.
Reading a whole book and pages of text sounds very scary. But this book is only fifteen pages, so I think we can do it :smiley: And there is even an audio video of someone reading it!

Pros and Cons for the Book Club

Pros

  • A book and not a manga
  • Free
  • Audio video
  • Selectable text, if you read in a browser, you can use Yomichan and / or easily copy paste sentences

Cons

  • A book and not a manga
  • It seems that the version in Japanese Stories for Language Learners is not the same as the one in Aozora
  • No furigana in the Aozora free version
  • Short length, will be read in only one / two weeks by the club according to @Shadowlauch

Pictures

Sample

The first paragraph:

武蔵の国のある村に茂作、巳之吉と云う二人の木こりがいた。この話のあった時分には、茂作は老人であった。そして、彼の年季奉公人であった巳之吉は、十八の少年であった。毎日、彼等は村から約二里離れた森へ一緒に出かけた。その森へ行く道に、越さねばならない大きな河がある。そして、渡し船がある。渡しのある処にたびたび、橋が架けられたが、その橋は洪水のあるたびごとに流された。河の溢れる時には、普通の橋では、その急流を防ぐ事はできない。

Additional Pages

There you go, the whole book:

Difficulty Poll

How much effort would you need to read this book?

  • 1 - No effort at all
  • 2 - Minimal effort
  • 3 - Moderate effort
  • 4 - Substantial effort
  • 5 - So much effort my head might explode :exploding_head:
  • I don’t know
0 voters
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I feel like my brain is short circuiting trying to figure out if some of these words are people’s names, place names, or archaicisms. I’m mostly scanning but is the rest of it like the first few sentences?

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I looked through the books I already have and here’s a copy that includes 雪女(ゆきおんな) with furigana. I no longer feel like my brain is short circuiting, it’s much easier to tell what are places/people/things with the furigana

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Well the story is in the public domain now so there are free versions of it, not sure readers will want to buy a book (though it looks like a nice book).

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