Let's read Harry Potter from September 1st!

This will be the schedule for the first 8 chapters. There are so many different versions so I’m not going to try to figure out page numbers or find a good place to break inside each chapter. Some may want to finish the chapter in 1 day and others may need the whole 2 weeks for the chapter. I put this in the first post in the thread too. Does this look OK?

Chapter 1: September 1-13 (1 day shorter since I want us to start on September 1!)
Chapter 2: September 14-27
Chapter 3: September 28 - October 11
Chapter 4: October 12-25
Chapter 5: October 26 - November 8
Chapter 6: November 9-22
Chapter 7: November 23 - December 6
Chapter 8: December 7-20

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Thank you, @Radish8! I’ll put this in the first post too.

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Perfect for a lil Christmas break!

You can also buy the JP edition ebook on US Amazon for about $9.

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Thank you! I’ll put that in the first post too.

Yes, I think we’ll need a break around Christmas! That will give those who fall behind some time to catch up too.

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I bought the first volume but it looks quite hard, I’ll try the first chapter anyway. :cowboy_hat_face:

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I got the split ones because I love the covers

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Yeah, it’s just realising that you need to get #2 :wink: not suggesting people won’t want them, but I’d hate to find out I’d only bought half a book when I thought I was getting a whole one.

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Wow this is definitelly a challenge. I don’t know If I’m able to do such a thing. I haven’t still red a novel in Japanese.

By the way, this might be of interest for everybody. Here there is the audio version free:
https://stories.audible.com/discovery/enterprise-discovery-21122527011?ref=adbl_ent_anon_ds_ds_dccs_sbtp-0-13

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I’ve bought Harry Potter part 1 in Japan last year but never dared to start
I’m not sure if I’m good enough yet but I like this challenge idea and I want to try and join in.

waves at fellow Dutchies

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Hi son! Goedenavond!

I’m level 21 in Wanikani, and it seems that Harry Potter 1 is way above my reading skills. But I’m in anyway (the ebook has been sitting in my PC for a while now).

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I’m in the exact same situation - the book is way above my skills. I do want to try anyway! Welcome!

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What level do you think this is, compared to the book clubs here on WK? I think I have seen it discussed on both the intermediate and beginner book clubs. Is it too long for the intermediate book club and too advanced for the beginner book club? I think it’s best to run this outside the book clubs since it’s so long, but it would be interesting to know if this is about the right level for the intermediate book club.

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Hmm. I don’t know the exact level. Grammar wise, I don’t think it is too much worse than Kiki’s delivery service, but the vocabulary is definitely more varied which makes it harder.

One good thing I’ve noticed so far after slogging through the first two chapters is that a fair amount of the vocabulary is repeated. This make the book slightly easier the farther you get.

It’s definitely a big challenge, and if you want to look up every word you don’t know (at least for me), it would take a long time to get through and a lot of patience. For someone around my level of japanese (comfortable with some easy native material but a bit weak with vocabulary), I’d recommend reading for 80% comprehension most of the time in order to get through it in a reasonable amount of time.

The good thing about knowing the story is that you can skip the really hard parts if you are getting frustrated. On Kindle I just highlight sentences I want to come back to later. I don’t feel bad doing this because I already know the story pretty well.

That’s just me though. I’m sure there are many more advanced learner’s who can go for more and many more ambitious learner’s around my level.

Sorry for the long answer :sweat_smile:
That’s what happens when I write a reply before I have any :coffee:.

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At this pace I’d say beginner, but maybe someone who knows the clubs better should be the judge of that

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Yeah I guess this is true at this pace. I was able to get through chapter two in maybe five hours of reading; so spread out over two weeks that would be very manageable. I think the content itself is probably harder than beginner (especially vocabulary-wise), but due to the pace beginner might be about right.

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I think it’s a difficult one. The length would actually make it ineligible for both the Beginner and Intermediate clubs, though of course that doesn’t make it more difficult in itself. I’ll just weigh in on the pace aspect.

The pace you’re planning - two weeks per chapter - seems much more beginner, but looking at the actual page counts you seem slightly more in intermediate territory. That’s just a rough approximation from the page counts on Amazon, which gives somewhere between 14 and 16 pages per week. If anybody can provide more accurate page counts that would help.

(For those comparing, it’s worth bearing in mind that we’re reading Kiki’s Delivery Service faster than is really appropriate for Beginner Club level, and that it’s one of the hardest books in our ‘catalogue’ - even so we’re only reading an average of 12 pages per week, which is less than this would be from the looks of it.)

People who’ve actually participated in both should have a better idea. I’ve always had the impression from those who’ve read it that it was definitely a tough one and “not for beginners”, but I don’t know how much prior experience they had.

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A lot of vocab that you don’t really need to knkw outside of HP fandom, so unless you plan on joining a Japanese fanclub, you don’t need to actually remember it for the longterm. That’s not to say there aren’t any useful words in there, there are a bunch!

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