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

Ahh, it’s good to hear that! My copy hasn’t arrived yet, but I started reading the example pages in advance and some of the characters and even some of the furigana were a little hard to make out and could take me awhile to figure out what to search for. So far I’ve gotten them all eventually, but it slowed me down quite a bit a couple times, trying to look up words I didn’t know and couldn’t quite make out. 極冠 (きょっかん) for example on page 7 – kept searching for きょつ and had no luck and the first kanji was just a mush. So yeah, hearing the new books are easier to read is a relief!

Aye, there’s some pretty complex kanji on the first handful of pages.

On a similar note, I bought a volume of Weekly Shonen Jump a few years ago for reading practice, and some of the more detailed kanji are literally just black blobs. It’s like, can even native Japanese people read what’s written here?

1 Like

how do i join?

Get a copy of the book and join in! :grin:

It sounds like the plan is to have polls to indicate that you’re participating at the beginning of each chapter, but seriously, the only requirement to join in is to get the book, start reading it, and join in the discussion (starting 23rd of June).

3 Likes

A real beginner’s book…

So, I’ve struggled through three and a half volumes of Yotsuba with the Yotsuba Reading Club here (which is amazing and full of the most wonderful, most kind, most patient people you could imagine) but it is a struggle… Yotsuba is still far too difficult for me (and full of slang that I should not be learning) and so really I need something easier.

I do not want to learn from a text book, I couldn’t think of anything worse, but finding a good book for low levels is tough… but I think I’ve found one! I started reading it today and it is brilliant! Just the right level for me, with just the right amount of challenge and a lot, a lot, of fun!

Here’s the book: にゃんにゃん探偵団

I know it will be far too easy for most people in this group, and for most people on WK, but for true beginners, it is perfect. And it’s a mystery… with cats!

Could we set up a new group, the “Just getting started with Japanese reading group” or something like that, and read this book? It’s perfect for those of us for whom Yotsuba is too difficult but who desperately want to read real Japanese.

1 Like

I recommend just starting a club for that specific book or series. That’s what was done with Kawabata and it seems to be working fine. I think it might get complicated having a third regular book club group that votes on different books.

2 Likes

Looks kinda cute, aside from any intent to form a reading club for it - are there any sample pages available anywhere?

1 Like

The link they gave has the first 10 pages or so.

1 Like

Brilliant! Can I just go ahead and do that then? I’ll take a look at that other thread you mentioned and see how it worked there. Thank you!

2 Likes

You can also see sample pages here: にゃんにゃん探偵団1 にゃんにゃん探偵団 - ブックライブ Browser Viewer
(No need to sign up for anything, just click to the left of the picture for the next page)

1 Like

How about this?!

I feel like you could also advertise it in the Cat club thread and/or the cat appreciation thread :thinking:

3 Likes

Great idea! Thank you!

1 Like

Oh, so it does. I was looking in the wrong place…

2 Likes

@Radish8 @Abstormal So I want to figure out what options to include for the participation poll in each chapter thread. So far we have:

  • I’m reading along
  • I’m catching up / I’m catching up on a previous chapter (which wording is better?)
  • I’m sitting out (is there another way to put this?)

I’m not against including the “necro” option as @Radish8 put it, but I’m not sure how to word that option to not be confusing to people reading now with the book club.

1 Like

Perhaps the one for the first chapter should be a little different. How about:

  • I’m reading along
  • I’m sitting this book out
  • I am from the future and am reading this after the book club but using these threads to help
  • I’m not even in this book club but I like clicking on polls

That seems like it gives you the information you want, without getting weird results in future or confusing people about what they should pick.

I’m struggling to work out the best options for subsequent chapters though. Something like this would let people participating currently provide the most sensible status updates:

  • I’m reading along
  • I’m still reading the book but I haven’t reached this chapter yet / I reached it after the scheduled date
  • I don’t think I’m going to continue reading this book

I think you could just make it clear that those polls are for people reading along currently with the book club, because that’s who we want to know about (I think?!).
Maybe there could be a poll for the last chapter or in the main thread at the end where people could indicate if they made it to the end of the book regardless of when they did it, and if not where they dropped it, but I don’t know how much uptake you’d get from people who dropped it.

2 Likes

I’m from the future, and this is the only time period in which Aria is known to exist.

8 Likes

Maybe we shouldn’t bother accounting for people who come after the book club is done. It makes it too confusing. I could always just close the polls after the entire book is done (that way people who are slightly behind can still set themselves in the poll).

  • I’m reading along
  • I’m still reading the book but I haven’t reached this chapter yet
  • I’m no longer reading the book

Yeah, I also think it makes it confusing. Closing the polls at the end is a good idea (maybe not right away, so that people who are behind have time to catch up).

I was suggesting a different one for the first chapter because the standard poll doesn’t make a lot of sense for the first chapter - how can you be reading the book but behind on the first chapter, or “no longer” reading the book?
If you’re going to have a different poll anyway it might be nice to have an option to see whether people continue to use the threads after the fact, but I think having a separate poll for that after the book is finished would be less confusing anyway.

1 Like

We should keep a “I just like to click things” as an option in all polls, as a good amount of users have been “broken” by the poll thread, we always have to click on every poll no mater what :wink:

On the last one there should be a poll that stays open all time, with one option for those who finished, and other option could be “I tried, but didn’t make it” or something to that effect. And keep it open so people who finish in the future can put their vote in too =)
But I agree on closing all the earlier chapter polls, who are there to see who is still active when we do them =)

5 Likes