しろくまカフェ
by ヒガ アロハ (Higa Aloha)
Summary
A slice-of-life story about a bunch of anthropomorphic animals who regularly meet in a cafe run by a polar bear. The series focuses on the interactions between these regulars, but frequently follows them to their respective jobs, which includes things like taking up part-time work at the local zoo.
Availability
Appears to have been reissued following its anime adaptation, but someone should independently verify this:
The original release (larger than a typical manga), which I have, appears to be out of print. It’s linked below anyway for reference.
The new edition is available digitally:
Personal Opinion
The setting and characters didn’t have the comedic feel or depth I was hoping for, so I haven’t read past the end of the first volume. That being said, it exudes Japaneseness and catching a pun to understand a joke is satisfying.
If the premise sounds like your kind of thing, you’ll probably like it a lot; if it sounds too surreal for you, as it did to me, at the very least, it’s excellent beginner reading practice.
Pros and Cons for the Book Club
Pros
- In many ways, this is an easier read than Yotsuba, provided the reader’s vocab isn’t much broader than what WaniKani teaches
- Stories are generally predictable, assuming familiarity with the animals involved, so the writing isn’t regularly throwing non sequiturs at readers
- Visuals and dialogue tend to be in very strong agreement
- Chapters are short
- Full furigana, except for asides and recipe pages (see first additional image)
Cons
- Most of the difficulty comes from the wordplay; every chapter includes a scene where a word or phrase is misinterpreted (with a visual aide) four times, and a lot of the jokes may fall flat if you don’t catch the puns
- The humour is very hit-or-miss, depending on the reader
Pictures
The size of the manga made a few corners a bit fuzzy. You may need to download the files and zoom in.
Additional Pages
The first one is too big for Discourse, hence the link.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/tpsnZtdyaK9EUV2r6
](https://photos.app.goo.gl/tpsnZtdyaK9EUV2r6!%5BIMG_20180623_211612123~2%7C375x500%5D(upload://vVzMIkwgFKV0tiSC8tIG80jClrz.jpg)){kind=link}
Difficulty Poll
How much effort would you need to read this book?
- No effort at all
- Minimal effort
- Just right
- Challenging
- Impossible, even with everyone’s help
- I don’t know (please choose this if you’re not voting seriously)
0 voters