[Looking for Nominations!] Beginner Japanese Book Club // Starting Soon: Death Note

[Shadowlauch]

I have added the rule the intermediate club uses to the guidelines

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?

and removed the 4 manga I mentioned in my previous post. This shrinks the list down quite a bit but I’m confident that we will get plenty of new ones until the next poll rolls around.

[NicoleRauch]

Hey @Toyger I’m not sure whether you noticed that your nomination - Death Note - was (finally) picked and will be read soon-ish (i.e. from January 22nd if I did not miscalculate)? Are you still up for running the book club?

[jhol]

Here’s a reminder that the Intermediate Book Club’s next pick, 地球星人, starts next week! If there were ever a book worth challenging yourself for, this is the one. I’ve read it in English and consider it one of the best books I’ve ever read. Also, Sayaka Murata’s writing style typically makes for a smooth transition to intermediate reading.

[Toyger]

I noticed! Looking very much forward to it! =D
Not sure I want to be the one to run it though. If anyone else who are joining wish to take the lead, that’d be great =)

[NicoleRauch]

@Toyger

If anyone else who are joining wish to take the lead, that’d be great =)

That’s totally fine! I’m sure we can find a volunteer to run the club.

Any takers?
(It’s no problem if you haven’t run a club before, we’re all here to help each other out not only on the Japanese stuff but also on the club-running stuff )

[NicoleRauch]

I’m happy to report that we finished the current pick! Here is the Satisfaction Poll in case you want to participate (or are just curious what the participants thought about the book).

I’m looking forward to reading our next pick, which is due to start in a week’s time

Also, we’re still looking for a volunteer who wants to run the Death Note book club If you’re interested, just shout in this thread.

[Shadowlauch]

Oh man time flies it feels like we did the poll yesterday…

I would be fine with running the Death Note club.

[Shadowlauch]

A bit early but the Death Note Home thread is up

[Shadowlauch]

Moved to the intermediate book club

Retracted

笑顔のたえない職場です。

Summary

新人少女漫画家の双見奈々先生は、年上の女性担当編集者の佐藤 楓さんやアシスタントの間 瑞希さんに支えられながら、時々本人曰く職業病の激しい妄想を拗らせながら、今日もお仕事中！ エンタメ業界を舞台にしたワーキングガールズコメディ、第1巻！ (Bookwalker)

Nana Futami, a rookie manga artist, is at work today with the support of her editor Kaede Sato and assistant Mizuki Hazama, sometimes suffering from what she calls her “occupational disease”! A working girls comedy set in the entertainment industry!

Availability

Physical: Amazon | CDJapan
Digital: Kindle | Bookwalker

Personal Opinion

I had so much fun reading this. It is a great comedy that got a lot of laughs out of me without being overly silly. I would say it is a bit on the more difficult side of things esepcially because of all the manga/industry terminology that needs to be build up, but I felt like the density did not overwhelm!

Pros and Cons

Pros

• Funny
• The volume can stand on its own
• Good density

Cons

• Manga industry terminology
• No furigana

Pictures

First Three Pages of Chapter One

Additional Pages

Bookwalker preview

Difficulty Poll

How much effort would you need to read this book?

[poll type=regular public=true]

• 1 - No effort at all
• 2 - Minimal effort
• 3 - Moderate effort
• 4 - Substantial effort
• 5 - So much effort my head might explode
• I don’t know

[/ [poll ]

[seanblue]

What is going on on page 5…

I have not read this manga, but I’ve read こみっくがーるず, which is also about mangaka. I already recognized the term ネーム on the first few pages. I do wonder where the term comes from though.

[Shadowlauch]

@seanblue

What is going on on page 5…

That was my reaction aswell when I first saw it but it is just the main characters imagination going wild and nothing close to that is ever mentioned/shown again.

[seanblue]

Understood. Is this mostly female cast or mixed cast?

[Shadowlauch]

Almost 100% female. In general it centers around the 3 women mentioned in the synopsis which takes up 95% of the first volume

[MrGeneric]

@seanblue

I do wonder where the term comes from though

I think I remember reading something about this a while ago: the most prominent theory relates to the fact that ネーム is old printing industry jargon for any type of printed text: i.e., captions, or speech bubbles in manga. Back before digital production, with physical letterpresses, typesetters needed to be able to know how to set up the printing press for the ネーム to be printed onto the artwork in the correct location. Since finished artwork takes a lot of time, typesetters had to be given a rough draft so they could properly prepare the ネーム locations for when the finished artwork was ready.

So the name (ha, sorry) for those rough drafts eventually just became ネーム, since it’s main purpose was preparing the printing press for that. Obviously no longer an issue with digital production being the norm nowadays, but the term stuck, regardless. (Not unlike us still calling glitches in computers “bugs”… The term came from an actual moth being stuck inside a relay in an electromechanical computer. )

Here is the page that I read that talks about the theory, for posterity: Why is a NAME called a NAME? / 5 criteria to watch out for – Japanese Manga 101 #028 – SILENT MANGA AUDITION®

[2OC3aOdKgwSGlxfz]

I’d suggest adding the lack of furigana as a Cons, just so that people are aware…

[Marusiaside]

Sorry for the stupid question. Is this the right thread to read if I want to help you choose next book? Was there a poll already asking if manga style is preferred to simple story? I was too busy full November to keep up with the chat.

[seanblue]

@Marusiaside

Is this the right thread to read if I want to help you choose next book?

This is the right topic, yes. But if you look at the first post you’ll see that the next two books have already been selected, so the books have been decided into mid-March. That means there will probably be another poll at the end of January or beginning of February.

@Marusiaside

Was there a poll already asking if manga style is preferred to simple story?

This is decided per poll by simply voting for the books or manga you want to read at the time. You don’t vote for a style. You vote for a specific book/manga. The first post also includes the current list of nominations. In the Beginner Book Club (here), most of the options/winners are manga, but regular books do get picked as well. In the Intermediate Book Club, it’s mostly books.

Also, it looks like there are only six nominations right now, so feel free to nominate some more options if you have something specific in mind.

[Marusiaside]

Master List of Book Clubs says that your next book is still TBD

[seanblue]

Sounds like whoever’s running those book clubs needs to add them to the master list then.

[NicoleRauch]

Unfortunately that position is a bit vacant since Radish disappeared some time ago; @Shadowlauch was so kind as to run the most recent poll but I don’t know whether we can persuade them to take on the full responsibility for this book club.
(Although we could try )

And no, I won’t run the club because it doesn’t make any sense imo to have a single person run the three three of the main book clubs