Just wanted to let you know I started to read this a bit more seriously, reading a small bit every day. But still going super slow. I wonder if one day I can catch up! 
Also I think āpestā just is an abbreviation of āPestilenceā, but canāt say for sure either. (opinion of german speaking person #2)
You definitely can! And thereās no rush either; this thread will always be open for questions and comments.
Hmm, that would make sense to me. Even the Japanese for bubonic plague is č ŗćć¹ć according to Wikipedia. I wonder why the English for the disease is so different? Spanish, Japanese, French, German all have some variation of āpestā in their names for itā¦ Japanese I assume picked it up from a European language.
This is a great idea! Iāll try to add some stuff later to it.
Woops, I totally missed that you asked this somehow, sorry!
It went okay I think! I had decided cos it was my first time doing the test to go for N3 which I was/am fairly confident that I should be able to pass. I did cram in a lot of tourism/activities (and just general walking) into the Friday and Saturday I was in London before the exam (coming down on the night bus probably didnāt help either) and between that and the organisational chaos of the exam itself I was majorly feeling the exhaustion by the time the final section (listening) came around. Because of that I know that I just completely blanked on a few questions near the end so I probably wonāt have done as well as I hoped to but Iām fairly confident that along with the other sections I hopefully will have passed!
In Flesh & Blood news, I continue to slowly inch through chapter 5. I swear I have been reading this chapter for what seems like a million years 
. I might see if I can get to a decent place in my other book club books over the next few days and then try to have a focused pirate boys week to give this book some decent attention rather than the 15-20 mins before falling asleep Iāve been managing lately!
Iāve added the lovely Character book pages in the main thread (at the end of the Wiki), so please check them out for the spelling of the names. ^>^
But, yeah, itās Jeoffrey Rockford. (donāt worry, there will be no shortening of his name. Thatās a very modern day thing to do anyway)
Thanks, very interesting! Lovely pictures by the way 
Your pic says Jeoffrey though? Which would be the third option 
But maybe itās just a misspelling, just like they misspelled poor Christopherās name? 
And admittedly, I still like Geoffrey best
Uh, same here! For me it sort of went ok-ish, I guess? Grammar etc. was fine, for reading I am never sure whether I got things right and whether I understood the questions correctly 
but in the end it usually is sufficient, and for listening it went not really well but again, in the end I usually seem to get by one way or another. So letās wait and see!
I mean, last time I failed by 2 points so I am somewhat entitled to have passed this time around, no? 
Especially for the history-heavy chapters, I found that I seriously need quality reading time to be able to get through them. Hereās hoping that you can finish this chapter off quickly 
By the way youāre now entitled to click the poll in the main thread 
Yeah, I typod that one! XD
now fixed!
But what do you mean they misspelled āChristopherā's name?
NOOOOO, now I see it! XD OMG. I have totally added a p there all this time! 
Now I sort of wanna check out the Drama CDs to see how they spell the names in the Cast list!
Edit: all in Japanese on the CD-release I checked.
I think itās just a typo in the English name, as the katakana version clearly contains ~ćć”ć¼ i.e. ā~pherā
Yeah. I guess so. English be hard! XD
I also added the lovely front page art of the Character book. This artist makes gorgeous cover art for the Drama CD release from CD release 4 and onward. Absolutely stunning stuff. 
The first 3 volumes are the same as the cover artist for the light novel. Itās just a much more generic style, which I donāt care much for.
Wow, very interesting. 
Iām kind of surprised the author did decide on a romanization, to be honest. Ah well, I donāt have a problem either way with the spelling. Jeoffreyās kind of a weird merge between the two anyway.
Iām glad it sounds like everything went okay, for the most part! Iāve never actually taken the JLPT myself, so it sounds pretty scary all around; I hope you guys pass!
Same here, those took by far the most effort for me. I think the only section I really just had to skim through and promise myself Iād come back later was when they were talking about the periodās clothing and how intricately you had to lace everything.
Done as well! I had completely forgotten about that until I was looking at the art pics ekg posted.
Iām with you there. Nothing wrong with the original artist, but they donāt do the first few books any favors. Makes me wonder what the books wouldāve looked like if they were redesigned with the later artistās artā¦
Dang it, I was going to ask @ekg a separate question, and now Iāve forgotten. :< Will edit here later if I rememberā¦
Edit: I see we have a āBicenteā in the house from those art book pics. (Edit: after much staring, that is a V.) (May I say, his art is smokinā.) XD Not sure I can bring myself to type that one out on the regular. I always love seeing romanizations straight from the creator. (Admittedly, thereās not necessarily any guarantee ę¾å²”ćŖć¤ć had much/any input romanizing those.) Amazing how they managed to turn Nigel so his eyepatch is barely noticeable. 
Nah, thatās just that the character looks so weird, itās still āVicenteā. (Although I donāt blame any Japanese person to spell him with āBā if all thatās known to them is the Spanish pronunciation ).
Here, I found you a chart of those old letters:
Hmm. The letter doesnāt look like a B or a V based on that chart, though.
I would love to be wrong; it just looks like it has more curves than a V should have. But then again it doesnāt have the double left lines that the B doesā¦ Maybe it is just a curvy V?
Edit: I think you are right, Nicole. After staring at it some more, itās definitely a V. The curves are just indicating the horizontal lines.
Ok next try with a chart with a more curvy V
Here you have a curvy B and V. They look incredibly similar, the only difference is that the B has a middle bar that goes all the way to the left while the V doesnāt have that, and our character in question also doesnāt have that.
Wow, that chartās worse, haha. I do agree that itās a V, though; edited my post above.
Itās not the chartās fault, though
A long time ago Iāve done a fair bit of family genealogy, and reading this kind of font in a sloppily handwritten style (in old church books) is next level altogether Luckily my grandmother was still alive back then and could help me with the worst bits, but some words I never figured outā¦
So, Iāve been slogging my way through the āintroā of this series. That was a lot of exposition for sure in chapter 1. ^^; Glad thatās over and done with. 
Iām just at the start of ch 3 so quite a long way to go yet! But, I do like how much easier the text flows. ^>^ (I keep hearing 大å·éās voice for Vincenteās monologue/dialogue in my mind XD).
I think Iām going to try doing a better job at looking up stuff now that Iām in the main story proper.
Totally forgot to reply to this one 
I must admit that I skimmed that section as well and did not try to follow each little detailā¦ what I took away was that he somehow got his trousers laced to the shirt with a million small ribbons or something? Because they did not have elastic material like rubber bands or suspenders, I guess? The only thing I could think of was that when his trousers were tied to his shirt all around, what if he suddenly needs to go to the toilet very urgently? 
Will he always walk around with his boy following him around so that he can untie him in due time?
If somebody got a better understanding of this (or a picture, even) and could help me understand the intricacies of the male dresscode at the time, that would be amazing!
Ch. 3, page 118:
I do love how Jeoffrey directly address how religion sees people like him. We get a bit of background about his family as well. 
Itās a neat way to settle the score in a way, and bring home the fact that heās unapologetically gay. 
Gotta love all that research thatās gone into this story. 
Ch 4, p 126
Just now I came across the name of Nicholas Hilliard - Wikipedia the painter. Itās part of how Jeoffrey reflects on the tiny photograph of Kaito from his wallet. Hilliard was known for his miniature portraits of the Elizabethian court!
Itās a really interesting way of getting into the mindset of someone living in the 16th century, transporting us away from our modern-day thinking of something as ordinary as a photograph.
Edit: Next up is a mention of Thomas Cavendish (chapter 5, p 136).
Listening to the Drama CDs I defo didnāt catch all these names, either because they were not part of the adaption, or because they got lost in the listening comprehension (there being quite a lot of information to keep track of, makes this a pretty difficult audio drama).
Edit 2:
I need to stop in the middle of my reading, lol. Jeoffrey is described as wearing a pearl-earring, reminicent of Walter Raleigh. In fact, on wikipedia we have the painting of Raleigh wearing just this sort of earring!
Oh, nice! I donāt remember if I caught the reference to him having pierced ears. I wonder how common that was back then/for men?
