Thanks for all your inputs! I’m sure I’ll find something fitting amongst all those options! 
I bought both コンビニ人間 and コーヒーが冷めないうちに from Verasia (I’m in the Netherlands) so I second them as a good place to order from (though they are often out of stock, too)
I’ve heard (but haven’t tried it), that they respond really well if you email them with the book you want, even when they don’t list it or don’t have it in stock.
Ah, good to know - I was waiting for あん to come in stock so might as well email them. A while back I also requested them to let me know when a few books came in stock and they did email me after a couple of weeks, which was nice.
And the polls are closed.
Our winner is コンビニ人間 and we’re starting June 17. If anyone is planing to get this in physical, it would probably be good to order soon.
We have two more things to decide, and they are kinda interconnected: schedule and use new or old weekly threads.
The reason they are interconnected is that it would get very confusing if we had a reading week that was covered by two different old threads, and no matter how much we slow things (half speed, 2/3rd speed), our reading assignments will always touch on the old threads multiple times. And keeping track of where to find old comments and where to post new comments could get pretty confusing with the old threads.
The benefit of using the old threads would having a no brainer (no extra click) access to all comments and questions from previous times it has been read as a club (which have happened twice (using the same threads)). It could also be beneficial for anyone coming to this late, having access to all comments for any one section in the same place.
New threads would separate out our comments away from the previous clubs’ comments, but I can always link the old threads in each weekly post (perhaps with a little explanation on how they connect). The benefit would be that each weekly thread with its first post will clearly spell out how many (and which) pages we’re reading, where we are stopping and all that. It would also be clear where to ask questions and post comments on specific pages. But we also (potentially) lose the brain trust of those that have read the book before that could come back to help us if we need it.
It isn’t entirely clear cut what option would be best, but it is true that if we want to completely control our own reading schedule, it will be a lot easier to have our own threads, so we won’t have that problem of figuring out where to post a question. Basically, I think if we want to use the old threads, we shouldn’t have reading assignments that cross from one thread to another in the middle of a week.
We’ve had a few different thoughts on schedules throughout and forgive me if I’m forgetting one, but I think the ones that have been raised are these (in no particular order):
- Cut IBC’s speed in half and find a good spot to switch over to their speed
- Take each IBC assignments and decide on a number of weeks to cover that (similar to the option 1, but instead of designating an end point for each week, the reader have to decide how to manage their reading load each week to reach a certain point after 2-3 weeks)
- Start by cutting the speed in half (or there about) and then poll for when to increase and decide how to increase at that time, with the goal of reading IBC speed before/by the end (this means that the schedule would initially basically say that we’d read the whole book at half speed until we polled to raise it) → OBS! Do realize this means a lot of polls all the time, and basically leaving the schedule undecided for a large part of our read. (In my personal opinion it is better to have an increase on the schedule so you can prepare for it in advance, we can still poll to change our minds. But the option stays since everyone isn’t me. xD)
- Cut IBC’s speed in half (or there abouts) and create a schedule that increases incrementally throughout, with IBC pace reached close to the end or earlier. And potentially still poll on whether to speed up sooner/faster or delaying the speed up a little.
Two things: (a) Saying cut the speed in half is an approximation, and is more about general pages (aka 5ish per week to start), and (b) no matter what option we go with (except for option 2), there will be a lot of awkward stopping points, middle of a scene for sure, middle of conversations, that kinda thing.
To accommodate that certain schedules would work well with old vs new threads:
Which schedule would you prefer?
-
#1 with NEW
threads -
#1 with OLD
threads -
#2 with NEW threads
-
#2 with OLD threads
-
#3 with NEW threads
-
#3 with OLD threads
-
#4 with NEW threads
-
#4 with OLD threads
- Other, please comment
0 voters
(Added emoji to make it easier to differentiate between the options. Historical architecture vs modern technology. ^_____^)
Poll will be open for one week, so will close next Sunday May 21st.
If anyone thinks I missed something important, I’ll redo the poll.
This is the overarching schedule, so after we’ve picked one, I’ll build a couple of versions (probably) of the schedule picked, and we’ll nail it down the specifics.
Thank you @Book9 for the detailed layout of the options!
Just a word of warning from my side regarding this option:
I‘d be afraid that this is too long a stretch for the target audience which is beginning novel readers. I think it’s very tempting to not read enough in the first week(s) because there’s still sooo much time left to catch up, you know what I mean? And in interval 2 everybody might already be behind schedule… 
Regarding loss of brain power from previous readers: It could be an option to post the new threads in the old threads, This way former members who are interested in helping can follow the new threads easily.
And now the fun of creating a schedule for something I can’t skim or know the story beats at all. Right now I really wish I had a paper copy. I’m definitely going to need someone who has one, to help with that. Since I’m pretty sure we have paper readers.
My problem is the ebook I have from Kobo has reflowable text as I change the font size. Meaning I can at best get a percentage.
So I’m going to make a list of all the section breaks, hopefully there aren’t like tons and tons, because the only way to find them is to page through the book. I’ll be noting the ending phrase and % of ebook where it is at. I might miss a section if it happens to split between pages for me.
Section Number (no section is actually numbered or named). Ending % (Kobo), Ending phrase, Page number (once someone gets that for me)
Start: 0%
- 3%, おにぎりを並べ始めた。
- 7%, どんどん大人になっていった。
13%, 人間にしているのだった。
Nope, that idea is not gonna work. Because I’m gonna be missing a lot of sections when they fall between pages, and any time I resize the text it throws me around. So finding missing ones that way just make this waaay to labor intensive.
So, how to do it then…
I could try and make my settings match the page count as closely as possible to a paper version, but for that I’d need to know what the page count of the actual story is (minus any end matter stuff basically, there is like an essay/interview thing at the end, for example). So if someone with a paper copy can give that, then I can work to match that and then just start with 5 pages and try to chop every 5 pages for a few weeks, to then gradually add more.
EDIT: From @anon99047008’s suggestion, I looked at the end page numbers I have from the old IBC schedule, and the hardback is 151 while the paperback is 161 pages. I changed the font to as close as I could for either of those numbers and ended up with 155 pages. And that seems like as close as I can get. So I’ll use that to build a schedule tomorrow. (Noting ending phrases and the % I get in for those, and then hopefully paperback/hardback readers can give me the actual page numbers to fill in later. ^^
If the amount of sections continue being as many as they are early in, I should be able to find good stopping points a lot more than I thought, but otherwise it will be whenever is necessary.
I’ve also added a poll to OP about which version people will be reading (also a new participation poll for actually reading コンビニ人間; and while adding that I accidentally killed the old one…), so please vote in it. 
Might be a silly question and something you already thought of, but can’t you go off of the page counts in the original threads? Their schedule chart has the paperback, hardback, and Kindle percentages listed (though as you say, the percentages are kinda inaccurate).
The problem kinda comes when I need to chop up the early sections in two, and then when we will start building, it just gets completely unusable since that schedule was actually fairly consistent, so we’ll have reading sections across original weeks of IBC, and I guess I could use the paper ending page number from there though.
Thanks for the idea. I got my settings to 154 pages, so almost exactly in the middle of the paperback and hardback. ^^
I’m also happy to look for break points, as I’ve previously read nearly half the book, it won’t be a spoiler for me.
Edit: if you just let me know roughly where to look.
I have the paperback, if still needed.
ABBC sounds like the real 
. I propose changing Advanced Book Club acronym to AdBC.
Also +1 for UBBC.
This book uses indentation to start a new section/thought.
Kinda hard to spot at first glance, but there are many of them.
The schedule poll is closed.
Time for me to make the schedule… 
I don’t have a physical copy, only a kobo ebook version (and reading it on a kobo reader). So the page numbers I get are very iffy because I can change the font size whenever I want.
My ebook is now set up so that the story is 144 pages. From the original IBC schedule, the paperback ends the story on page 151, and the hardback ends it on 141. But the story probably doesn’t start on page 1. (This is maybe close to the paperback version.)
Hopefully what this gives me is close-ish, but I don’t know. I’ll do the first 10 weeks, and then ask a paperback reader check their copy so I’ll know how close it is. (Unless only people with hardback is available, then I guess we’ll compare with that.)
Once I know how my page count compares to physical, I can make the rest of the schedule.
The best way I can do this is to have my kobo reader give me the chapter page numbers. That means the page count will currently assume the story starts on page 1. So I’m putting question marks on both page number for PB and for page count, to show these are currently Kobo ebook generated numbers.
% of the whole ebook starts on 1%. (I assume even % for ebooks will be different across different versions, ereaders or whatever, that is not something we can accommodate though, I think…)
I don’t think any of the phrases are spoilers, but I barely read them (just transcribed them) and they are never a whole sentence, so hopefully not.
| Week | Start Date | End Page (PB) | End Page (HB) | End Kindle Location | End Percentage Ebook | End Phrase | Page Count |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| #1 | Jun 17th | 5? | 4% | おにぎりを並べ始めた。 | 5? | ||
| #2 | Jun 24th | 9? | 6% | 大人はほっとしたようだった。 | 5? | ||
| #3 | Jul 1st | 14? | 10% | どこか作り物めいて感じられた。 | 5? | ||
| #4 | Jul 8th | 20? | 13% | 私を正常な人間にしているのだった。 | 7?* | ||
| #5 | Jul 15th | 25? | 17% | 喋ると不思議とちょうどいい。 | 6? | ||
| #6 | Jul 22nd | 30? | 20% | ユカリは私に笑いかけ続ける。 | 6? | ||
| #7 | Jul 29th | 35? | 23% | 膝の上で静かに撫でた。 | 5? | ||
| #8 | Aug 5th | 40? | 26% | 菅原さんが姿を現した。 | 6? | ||
| #9 | Aug 12th | 46? | 30% | 私は急いで自分の仕事に戻った。 | 7? | ||
| #10 | Aug 19th | 52? | 34% | ケーキのクリームがついた唇を拭った。 | 7? |
Empty schedule rows
#11|Aug 26th|X?|||%|XXX|X?|
#12|Sep 2nd|X?|||%|XXX|X?|
#13|Sep 9th|X?|||%|XXX|X?|
#14|Sep 16th|X?|||%|XXX|X?|
#15|Sep 23rd|X?|||%|XXX|X?|
#16|Sep 30th|X?|||%|XXX|X?|
#17|Oct 7th|X?|||%|XXX|X?|
#18|Oct 14th|X?|||%|XXX|X?|
#19|Oct 21st|X?|||%|XXX|X?|
#20|Oct 28th|X?|||%|XXX|X?|
#21|Nov 4th|X?|||%|XXX|X?|
#22|Nov 11th|X?|||%|XXX|X?|
#23|Nov 18th|X?|||%|XXX|X?|
#24|Nov 25th|X?|||%|XXX|X?|
#25|Dec 2nd|X?|||%|XXX|X?|
*this is more like 5.5 pages (with my set up), the last page only has half a line and the first page is only half a page.
I bolded those phrases that are in the middle of a section.
So hopefully someone has time to look at these and see what a paperback/hardback things of these… Hopefully it’ll be good. 
What I need from my physical copy helper (sorry it is time consuming D:): Note/convey the page number the story starts on, and please also convey what page the story ends on (just for confirmation). Please also convey the page number each section ends on so I can calculate page count from that, aka you don’t need to do page counts.
On a side note, I was looking to increase the page count towards the last few weeks I filled in, but I see now that the average comes out almost exactly 5 pages per week. 
Also do realize that some of those page counts, do count half a page (or less) as a page. Because I didn’t want to start adding fractions, and rounding up is probably better.
Thanks, any chance you can check which pages the first 10 weeks end on?
(Also, why are there multiple paper editions so they all have different page counts. 
)
Do you think you can send me a photo of how your last page of week 10 looks like? I checked for week 1 to be sure, and the end phrase is half way through page 11 of my edition 
They won’t look the same, so I’m not sure that would help. Ebooks are reflowable, meaning that pages are not static, depending on font size, text will move around. So I don’t think pictures will help. Try looking around page 58. But it might be a few pages later since your edition is longer. The phrase is at a break, so should be fairly easy to spot.
Found it! Its the first sentence of page 62
I read this book at the beginning of the year as part of another book club and it’s now one of my favorite books of all time.
I don’t think I’ll re-read it since it was so recent but I may read the discussions and reply to people’s comments!