Yesterday I bought my second Kindle to have one connected to the Japanese kindle store [you can only do this if you are a resident of Japan, which luckily currently I am. If you want to do this and are not a resident, there are a few ways to get around this but I do not technically legal and amazon may shut down your account]
Anyways, I bought the original Kiki’s delivery service books in a set as a sort of goal to work towards, they are on the easier spectrum of Japanese literature, but still rather challenging.
Right ow I’m reading the Magic Treehouse series by Mary Pope, because I loved them as a child and they are in really easy Japanese.
I love reading [which you can probably tell by the fact that I have 2 kindles], and have started really using reading as a study method, and it has been so much fun. Although I live in Japan up until now I never really had time to read that much Japanese, buying a kindle really motivates you to use it.
I have a set of Doraemon books that are translated in to English for the purpose of children learning English- so the original Japanese text is still in the corner of each frame. I imagine you’d still need a dictionary on hand to get through it, and some help from a grammar guide wink wink, Tae Kim’s grammar guide, but it’s pretty simple and probably workable.
I’ve only read through a couple pages myself, though. Can’t quite vouch for the whole series =P Also, a friend bought it in Japan, and then gave it to me after reading them all, so I don’t know if it’s even in circulation anywhere online or in America
I’ve been thinking about getting a paper white and connecting it to the amazon JP store. I’ll have to research what’s involved in getting it connected there. I actually do have a street address there I could use if they need a physical address. (anyone want to buy a house in the northern Tokyo suburbs?)
That’s great that the Magic Treehouse books are available via the device. I have a few hard copies of these and I agree they are really great reads - just a bit more challenging than the graded readers, but mainly due to the more expansive vocab used.
Since others have mentioned the Graded readers, some of them are available as an app on the apple App store for way cheaper than the actual book (I think like 2-3$?) While its just one story at a time, it can give you an idea of what the books look like at least without paying the hefty price for the books.
Well, yes, if you read it without any help, Yotsuba is difficult. But there’s loads of support! There are vocab lists for volumes one and two, and the great Yotsuba reading club here on the WK forums. We’ve read through volumes one and two and are now on volume three.
I don’t even have N5 grammar, but reading よつばと！with all the good people here has been an amazing experience, and a billion times more interesting (I am sure) than reading a kid’s book full of “I have three apples”.
Ah that’s possible! https://www.japanesegradedreaders.com/ This is their website, it seems like the links lead to the US/CAN app store so it might not be available in your country
I’m pretty sure I saw a post recently saying that the publisher had pulled the app to make changes and that it would be back, but I don’t think there had been an estimated date for that return. I’ve been trying to keep an eye out as I’m considering buying an iPad to use this app since it would cost about the same as importing all of the actual books, and I’d get more use out of an iPad.
