Intermediate Japanese Book Club
Welcome to our Japanese book club! In this club we choose a Japanese book, read it together, and discuss what we’ve read. It could be meaningful discussion on the content, questions about vocabulary and grammar that confuse us, or just motivating each other to keep moving.
We’d love it if you joined the club! All you have to do is buy the next book lined up, read along with the schedule and join in the discussion!
Expected reading pace: We aim to read books at ~15 pages per week (that number might vary a bit throughout, depending on the book’s breaks and chapters). For manga, depending on difficulty and chapter length, we will probably read one to several chapters per week. The pick’s exact reading schedule will be negotiated before the book club kicks off.
If you’re looking for something a bit more easygoing, maybe the Beginner Japanese Book Club // Now Reading: ひとりぼっちの〇〇生活 is for you!
And if you’re looking for a challenge, the Advanced Japanese Book Club // Now Reading: 本の読み方 スロー・リーディングの実践 should be right up your sleeve!
Now Reading: 妊娠カレンダー
Start Date: Oct 19th
Optional Start Date for slower IBC Primer Club: Oct 13th
End Date: Dec 27th
End date for IBC Primer: ca. end of January
Next: サイレント・ウィッチ 沈黙の魔女の隠しごと
Start Date: Jan 4th
End Date: TBD
Book Proposals
How to Propose Books
Proposal Guidelines
Courtesy of fl0rm and the beginner book club (adapted for this club).
-
Nominate something you are ready to read
- This is a big cooperative group, but there’s always a minority keeping things active. If your pick wins, there’ll be some expectation that you contribute throughout.
- If you can’t read your own sample pages (at least mostly) you may not be able to judge the difficulty effectively, and won’t be able to help others much.
- Furigana does not imply something is easy (or vice versa); it’s just one factor contributing to difficulty.
-
Books nominated must not be longer than 350 pages
- Our reading pace means this is the longest we could tackle within a reasonable timeframe.
- A book of short stories can be longer: we will only pick select stories.
-
Do not nominate anything clearly NSFW
- This can be hard to judge without reading the book, but if you’d associate the work with fanservice or gore, even if just by reputation, please don’t suggest it for this group.
-
Try to pick something reasonably well-known
- This will increase the reader pool as more people will be interested / already have a copy.
- People will be more able to re-sell or pass along their copy after reading.
- Popular works often have more accessible language.
- Some participants may have already read it, and themes are probably broadly understood, making it easier for members to help each other and for readers to draw inferences from context.
-
Books that fail to score at least 20% on the last three round of voting will get automatically removed.
- This approach ensures that the list remains reasonably small and dynamic.
- You may nominate a removed book again, but please think about it before hand. Do you think there’s reasonable interest for that nomination?
Proposal Template
Taken directly from the beginner book club.
Copy this template into a new post when proposing a book/manga.
For page samples, you can either take photos of your own copy (try to make the three additional pages ‘representative’ if possible), grab photos from the internet, or use previews from e.g. Amazon, BookWalker, EBookJapan. Make sure the text is legible!
# Insert Title Here
Author:
Page count:
Natively link:## Summary
[details=“Japanese”]
Add Japanese summary here.
[/details]
[details=“English”]
Add English summary here.
[/details]## Availability
Insert link to book on amazon.co.jp here.
Insert link(s) to eBook here, or mention if an eBook is not available.## Personal Opinion
Insert why you think this book would be good to read, personally and for the book club here.### Pros and Cons for the Book Club
#### Pros
* Insert pros here.
#### Cons
* Insert cons here.## Pictures
[details=“First Three Pages of Chapter One”]
Insert images here (can be photos from you or the internet, or from ebook previews).
[/details][details=“Additional Pages”]
Insert a few more images here - try to make them representative.
[/details]
Current Proposals
The nomination posts linked under each entry will give you further information, including sample pages.
1. 人質の朗読会
Nomination Post
Page count: 247
人質の朗読会 (‘the recitals of the hostages’) is another work by Ogawa, like Revenge, that is only very loosely a novel and is composed of a series of essentially distinct stories – nine of them. The set-up, or framing device, is quite striking – bizarre even - and naturally colors the reading of the pieces themselves: a short prefatory section explains that a minibus with seven tourists, their guide, and the driver, travelling somewhere on the other side of the globe, was attacked by a group of local anti-government guerillas while on its way to visit some local ruins. The tourists and their guide were taken hostage; negotiations went nowhere, and after more than three months the government launched an attack against the rebels; the hostages were all killed in the rescue attempt. Two years later recordings from their time in captivity were made public, recording of each of the eight hostages recounting a story or memory they had written – a task they had been able to focus on in their otherwise so difficult situation.
The rest of the book then consists of these eight recitals by the hostages, one for each evening.
4. 森崎書店の日々
5. 夜警
6. すずめの戸締まり
7. 家守綺譚
8. 阪急電車
9. お探し物は図書室まで
Over at Natively, there is also a list of the WK Intermediate Japanese Book Club Nominations | Japanese list by nikoru | Natively, where you can directly check out the books’ levels and reviews.
Purchasing Books
Please see the Discussion Thread of the current book for direct purchasing links.
Physical Books
Two good options for purchasing physical books are:
The former has economy shipping options which are likely to be cheaper but slower. You can also check out the Amazon site for your home country, or might be able to find the book on Amazon US.
If you can’t find an online store that will ship to you, you can use a forwarding service like Tenso or White Rabbit Express to forward the package to you for a fee. Alternatively, you may be able to find the book at a local Japanese book store such as Kinokuniya; just google your area.
Book types:
- 単行本 (たんこうぼん): “stand-alone book”. Hardcover or paperback, denoted by ハードカバー or ソフトカバー. Slightly larger than 文庫本.
- 文庫本 (ぶんこぼん): small-format paperbacks, cheap but usually well-bound.
eBooks
There are several places you may be able to purchase eBooks:
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eBook Japan | no regional restrictions; not Kindle-compatible | see this usage guide
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Book Walker | accepts paypal
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Honto | not Kindle-compatible; mobile reader app is region-locked – on Android, get an APK, on iOS, use JP App Store
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Amazon JP | check out sirvorn’s wonderful guide
Voice Chat
The club has a Discord server, which is sometimes used for voice chats / read-along sessions. See specific book threads for current activity.
Previous Books
Links to Discussion Threads
Book 1 | No. 6
Book 2 | Autumn Prison
Book 3 | An Unexpected Conclusion in 5 Minutes: Red Nightmares
Book 4 | The Devil is a Part-Timer!
Book 5 | Kino’s Journey
Book 6 | Convenience Store Woman
Book 7 | The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya
Book 8 | キッチン (Kitchen)
Book 9 | 氷菓 (Hyouka)
Book 10 | 夜市 (Night Market)
Book 11 | 聖☆おにいさん (Saint Young Men)
Book 12 | 博士の愛した数式
Book 13 | 君の名は (Your Name)
Book 14 | コーヒーが冷めないうちに
Book 15 | ヨコハマ買い出し紀行
Book 16 | 地球星人
Book 17 | 佐賀のがばいばあちゃん
Book 18 | Spy x Family
Book 19 | TUGUMI
Book 20 | おばちゃんたちのいるところ
Book 21 | 僕が愛したすべての君へ
Book 22 | あん
Book 23 | あなたも殺人犯になれる！
Book 24 | セーラー服と機関銃
Book 25 | 変な家
Book 26 | 妊娠カレンダー
Book 27 | サイレント・ウィッチ 沈黙の魔女の隠しごと
Over at Natively, there is also a list of the Books read by the WK Intermediate Japanese Book Club | Japanese list by nikoru | Natively so far.
Historic Votes
Book Selection Polls
| Poll # | Date | #Voters | Winner |
|---|---|---|---|
| Poll 1 | 2017-07-12 | 23 | No. 6 (conducted in the old thread) |
| Poll 2 | 2017-08-08 | 48 | Autumn Prison |
| Poll 3 | 2017-10-31 | 26 | Red Nightmares (An Unexpected Conclusion in 5 Minutes) |
| Poll 4 | 2018-02-27 | 18 | The Devil is a Part-Timer |
| Poll 5 | 2019-01-25 | 60 | Kino’s Journey (nomination) |
| Poll 6 | 2019-04-24 | 39 | The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya (nomination) Convenience Store Woman (nomination) |
| Poll 7 | 2019-08-15 Tie-break poll |
41 | キッチン (nomination) |
| Poll 8 | 2019-11-22 | 27 | 氷菓 (nomination) |
| Poll 9 | 2020-04-01 | 24 | Night Market (nomination) |
| Poll 10 | 2020-07-10 | 29 | 聖☆おにいさん (nomination) 博士の愛した数式 (nomination) |
| Poll 11 | 2021-01-09 | 26 | 君の名は (nomination) |
| Poll 12 | 2021-05-07 | 34 | コーヒーが冷めないうちに (nomination) |
| Poll 13 | 2021-09-08 | 34 | ヨコハマ買い出し紀行 (nomination) 地球星人 (nomination) |
| Poll 14 | 2022-02-16 | 40 | 佐賀のがばいばあちゃん (nomination) |
| Poll 15 | 2022-05-03 | 39 | Spy x Family (nomination) TUGUMI (nomination) |
| Poll 16 | 2022-09-13 | 21 | おばちゃんたちのいるところ (nomination) |
| Poll 17 | 2023-01-02 | 24 | 僕が愛したすべての君へ (nomination) |
| Poll 18 | 2023-05-19 | 31 | あん (nomination) |
| Poll 19 | 2023-09-06 | 26 | あなたも殺人犯になれる! (nomination) |
| Poll 20 | 2024-01-02 | 43 | セーラー服と機関銃 (nomination) |
| Poll 21 | 2024-06-05 | 27 | 変な家 (nomination) |
| Poll 22 | 2024-09-05 Decision Poll |
36 | 妊娠カレンダー (nomination) |
| Poll 23 | 2024-11-18 | 29 | サイレント・ウィッチ (nomination) |
Favorite pick poll
- Up to 10th book (poll #1 - poll #9)
- Up to 20th book (poll #10 - poll #16)
Other Polls
Poll regarding the beginner-level book club - Result: Beginners’ Book Club formed
Poll regarding how many votes each person should get - Result: 5 votes
Poll regarding whether to read two books in parallel - Result: no!
Poll to decide how to break the tie on round 7 - Result: extra poll
Archive
Proposals that got turned into their own book clubs
| Name + Book Club link | |
|---|---|
| 君の膵臓を食べたい I Want to Eat Your Pancreas |
Nomination Post |
| 魔法少女育成計画 Magical Girl Raising Project |
Nomination Post |
| 青春ブタ野郎はバニーガール先輩の夢を見ない Rascal Does Not Dream of Bunny-Girl Senpai |
Nomination Post |
| 世界から猫が消えたなら If cats disappeared from the world |
Nomination Post |
| マンガ✖くり返しでスイスイ覚えられる百人一首 Smoothly Memorise with Manga and Repetition: The Hyakunin Isshu |
Nomination Post |
Proposals that were removed due to lack of interest
In order to keep the list of nominations fresh and interesting, we might think about removing those that frequently get only few votes in the polls.
Therefore we set a threshold of 20%. A book will be removed from the list of nominations if it reached this percentage or less in three polls in a row. (The polls overview seems to always round down, so we need to manually recalculate if it is a close call.)
This table is used to keep track of the books that were removed or are in danger of being removed:
| Book | 1st time | 2nd time | 3rd time | Removed |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| (Manga) Made in Abyss | 08/2019 | |||
| (Manga) Land of the Lustrous | 08/2019 | |||
| The Familiar of Zero | 08/2019 | |||
| 紅霞後宮物語 | 08/2019 | |||
| The Closet of Nightmares | 08/2019 | |||
| Door D | 08/2019 | |||
| Wolf Children Ame & Yuki | 11/2019 | |||
| A lollipop or a bullet | 11/2019 | |||
| Tokyo Cat Stroll | 11/2019 | |||
| 最先端の日本酒ペアリング ー SAKE PAIRING |
07/2020 | |||
| 空挺ドラゴンズ | 07/2020 | |||
| １リットルの涙 難病と 闘い続ける少女亜也の日記 |
Poll 9 (12%) | Poll 10 (10%) | Poll 11 (11%) | 01/2021 |
| 灰と幻想のグリムガル | Poll 11 (11%) | 01/2021 (by nominator) |
||
| City | Poll 11 (7%) | 01/2021 (by nominator) |
||
| 変愛サイケデリック | Poll 10 (13%) | Poll 11 (3%) | Poll 12 (0%) | 05/2021 |
| All You Need Is Kill | Poll 11 (15%) | Poll 12 (11%) | Poll 13 (14%) | 09/2021 |
| もやしもん - Tales of Agriculture | Poll 11 (15%) | Poll 12 (17%) | Poll 13 (11%) | 09/2021 |
| ブギーポップは笑わない | Poll 11 (11%) | Poll 12 (17%) | Poll 13 (5%) | 09/2021 |
| ポーション頼みで生き延びます! | Poll 11 (3%) | Poll 12 (8%) | Poll 13 (14%) | 09/2021 |
| ifの悲劇 | Poll 12 (17%) | Poll 13 (14%) | Poll 14 (12%) | 02/2022 |
| くま クマ 熊 ベアー | Poll 13 (14%) | Poll 14 (20%) | Poll 15 (17%) | 05/2022 |
| City | Poll 13 (14%) | Poll 14 (12%) | Poll 15 (15%) | 05/2022 |
| 山と食欲と私 | Poll 13 (17%) | Poll 14 (10%) | Poll 15 (15%) | 05/2022 |
| 笑顔のたえない職場です。 | Poll 14 (17%) | Poll 15 (20%) | Poll 16 (9%) | 09/2022 |
| Just Because! | Poll 14 (10%) | Poll 15 (5%) | Poll 16 (4%) | 09/2022 |
| リング | Poll 15 (17%) | Poll 16 (9%) | Poll 17 (16%) | 01/2023 |
| 推しの子 | Poll 16 (19%) | Poll 17 (16%) | Poll 18 (19%) | 05/2023 |
| 日本人の知らない日本語 | Poll 16 (14%) | Poll 17 (16%) | Poll 18 (19%) | 05/2023 |
| 死にたいけどトッポッキは食べたい | Poll 16 (9%) | Poll 17 (12%) | Poll 18 (6%) | 05/2023 |
| 禎子の千羽鶴 | Poll 17 (4%) | Poll 18 (12%) | Poll 19 (7%) | 09/2023 |
| 少年と犬 | Poll 17 (12%) | Poll 18 (6%) | Poll 19 (7%) | 09/2023 |
| はたらく細胞 | Poll 17 (4%) | Poll 18 (3%) | Poll 19 (7%) | 09/2023 |
| ガイコツ書店員本田さん | Poll 17 (12%) | Poll 18 (16%) | Poll 19 (19%) | 09/2023 |
| かぐや様は告らせたい〜天才たちの恋愛頭脳戦～ (Kaguya-sama: Love is War) | Poll 18 (19%) | Poll 19 (3%) | Poll 20 (6%) | 01/2024 |
| 天気の子 | Poll 19 (15%) | Poll 20 (13%) | Poll 21 (14%) | 06/2024 |
| ぼっち・ざ・ろっく！ | Poll 20 (18%) | Poll 21 (11%) | 07/2024 (by nominator) | |
| 穴 | Poll 20 (9%) | Poll 21 (7%) | Poll 22 (2%) | 09/2024 |
| きらきらひかる | Poll 20 (11%) | Poll 21 (18%) | Poll 22 (5%) | 09/2024 |
| 嵐のピクニック | Poll 20 (11%) | Poll 21 (7%) | Poll 22 (11%) | 09/2024 |
| パレード | Poll 20 (11%) | Poll 21 (18%) | Poll 22 (16%) | 09/2024 |
| 旅猫リポート | Poll 20 (18%) | Poll 21 (18%) | Poll 22 (19%) | 09/2024 |
| 終末なにしてますか? | Poll 21 (3%) | Poll 22 (8%) | Poll 23 (6%) | 11/2024 |
| 阪急電車 | Poll 22 (8%) | Poll 23 (13%) | ||
| すずめの戸締まり | Poll 22 (19%) | Poll 23 (13%) | ||
| 夜警 | Poll 23 (10%) | |||
| 人質の朗読会 | Poll 23 (17%) |
Other
| Title___________ | Synopsis | Pitch | Store Link |
|---|---|---|---|
| ナナブンノイチ One in Seven | Seems to be a tale about a band of fraudsters / con artists planning an operation - with some double crossing intrigue going on between the members. Don’t know for sure about this book, but in general the author is known for having a comic style to his writing. | Post | Amazon |
| ネガティブハッピー・チェーンソーエッヂ Negative Happy Chainsaw Edge | This is by the same author as Welcome to the NHK and seems to contain some similar themes. However, it has a Kindle edition and is aimed at a youth audience so ought not to feature some of the more questionable content some people were worried about.
Story is about a high school boy who is riding home on his bike one day and comes across a girl fighting a man wielding a chainsaw. From what I can understand this is not really explained and is more a representation of the boy’s desire to find someone to ‘save’. The two team up and form a bond while the girl continues her nightly fights. | Post | Amazon |
| アフターダーク After Dark | Murakami’s shortest and probably easiest to read work. Set over the course of a single night and the first (I believe) of his novels not to be written from a first-person 僕 perspective, this centres on two sisters - one asleep in a mysterious room and viewed through a camera, the other out and about in Tokyo where she encounters various unusual characters including a jazz musician and a love hotel manager. | Post | Amazon |
| Classics Club | Oreki Houtarou is a self-proclaimed “energy-saver”—that is, he refuses to actively waste energy doing things that aren’t necessary. Though he had no interest whatsoever in participating in any clubs upon entering Kamiyama High School, he was commanded by his older sister, Tomoe, to join the club she was once a part of, the Classics Club, as it was in danger of being abolished due to its nonexistent member count. Together with his old friends Fukube Satoshi and Ibara Mayaka, as well as with the elegantly ladylike and curiously inquisitive Chitanda Eru, the newly reformed Classics Club ends up finding themselves involved in all sorts of mystery-solving escapades. Houtarou quickly learns that life in the Classics Club, just as Tomoe had promised, would be an interesting one indeed. And so begins the “Classics Club Series”. | Post | - |
| ほしのこえ | In this timeless, interstellar love story, the power of love must conquer the distance of outer space. Rated for teens. | Post | Amazon |
| 怒り | A grisly unsolved murder links three seemingly unrelated people in three different Japanese cities. | Post | Amazon |
| クリムゾンの迷宮 | From a rising new star of horror comes a killer read that will make you lose track of time and reality. The Crimson Labyrinth is a wicked satire on extremist reality TV in the tradition of The Running Man-if that indeed is what it is. Welcome to THE MARS LABYRINTH where things aren’t what they seem. Welcome to the world of Kishi, where the plot is as gnarly as the humor is twisted. When an unemployed former math major wakes up one day, he wonders if he’s somehow ended up on the red planet. The good-looking young woman with aid-she says her name is Ai and that she draws erotic comics for a living-seems to have no clue either as to their whereabouts. Their only leads are cryptic instructions beamed to a portable device. Has the game begun? There is no reset button, no saving and no continue-make the wrong move and it’s really GAME OVER. In the cruel world of THE MARS LABYRINTH, mercy and compassion are only for the weak or the very, very strong. The stakes are nothing less than your life-and apparently a lot of money. If you’re a fan of Lost or Battle Royale, don’t miss this one | Post | Amazon |
| やはり俺の青春ラブコメはまちがっている | Hachiman Hikigaya is a cynic. “Youth” is a crock, he believes–a sucker’s game, an illusion woven from failure and hypocrisy. But when he turns in an essay for a school assignment espousing this view, he’s sentenced to work in the Service Club, an organization dedicated to helping students with problems in their lives! How will Hachiman the Cynic cope with a job that requires–gasp!–optimism? | Post | Amazon |
Proposals that were removed for other reasons
言の葉の庭 (too long)
NANA―ナナ― (Manga) moved to the IMC
とんがり帽子のアトリエ (Manga) moved to the IMC
ぼっち・ざ・ろっく！ (Manga) moved to the IMC
Discussion Instructions
Discussions about the story start at the end of each reading period, but other discussions (for example on the language or on the book club itself) can of course be performed at any time. Just make sure to use [spoiler] tags for sentences that contain spoilers!
Early Book Club Members
はたらく魔王さま Member List
Snowflying- fl0rm
scaso- LucasDesu
- Naphthalene
- NickNickovich
- Momoiro
- AngelTenshi
Red Nightmares Member List
- LucasDesu
- Naphthalene
- NickNickovich
- Steffy47
- Ell
- Snowflying
- Toyger
- Rain32
- Angel
- charlesfm
- Dorotheian
Autumn Prison Member List
- Angel
- Caracal
- chrispthompson
- DuncanDean
- Hgbearawesome
- katiesaccount
- Kumirei
- LucasDesu
- mitsuki777
- Nath
- NickNickovich
- polv
- : saiakuma
- Scaso
- Snowflying
- Toyger
- Mechturk
- StellaTerra
- Alineiwane
- AnimeCanuck
- Answa
- Atrejub
- Ddleighc
- downtimes
- EiriMatsu
- ish93
- krokorock
- mechmouse
- Mohkargan
- Nehaahmed
- Netru
- Oryantge
- pgoonghang
- Riccyjay
chofas- Ell (lurking, will participate with next book and read the discussion of 秋の牢獄)
No. 6 Member List
- Addietaylor
- Answa
- Arnagos
- Caracal (slowly)
- Carlap
- Chrispthompson
- Downtimes
- GaijinInu641 (reading, but really slowly)
- Hgbearawesome
- Icefang97
- Ichou
- katiesaccount
- KuzunohaXIV
- LTMumfordIII
- LucasDesu
- Plumenator
- Scaso
- SilverRose009
- Snowflying
- Softlyraining
- Toc
- Aemaeth
- AmethystPersona0
- AngelTenshi
- Dimono (have the book but planning to just read at my own pace and read the discussion afterwards)
- Dnmj95
- Dokuchan
- Egd001
- Eucibous
- Hanalee
- Jhamonnet
- Jintanuki
- JKO
- Kumirei
- LankyAusMan
- MissMisc
- Obskyr
- Polv
- riccyjay
- Toyger
- Trishcakes
- Tru
- Anchang
- Annshin
- Bakugou
- Ersikan
- Humla
- Maxkao
- Tapatun
- AnimeCanuck (still working on grammar)
- DuncanDean (lurking, has ordered 秋の牢獄 for the next round)
- Kyayna (lurking, will participate with next book)
- Megbc (lurking, will participate with next book)
- NathaliRe (lurking, will participate with next book)
- Pydron (lurking, will participate with next book)
Key
: Has book and is currently reading along.
: Has book but is not yet reading.
: Has ordered or will order / buy book.
They were actually the final push that made begin learning Japanese. Before I was like I don’t really like subtitles so I think I’ll learn Japanese. But then these came out and at the time I couldn’t find translations, so I began my Japanese studies!
) but I can’t order it through either account… any tips? D: