Day 25 
告白 ~2%
Candy and Cigarettes last 23 pages of vol.1
Day 26 
ゲゲゲの鬼太郎 26 pages
佐賀のがばいばあちゃん (IBC), chapter 5 and 6
I had watched a movie called 告白 many years ago, and I remember enjoying it a lot - it was a twisted tale of revenge set in a school (as many Japanese stories tend to be). Recently I found out that the movie was actually based on a book, and that said book has won the Japan Booksellers’ Award, so this is what I’ll be reading next. I only managed a tiny 2% for now, but I’m hoping to pick up speed in the coming days. The format is rather intimidating, with pages chock-full of text, as all of it is indirect speech (I think by various of the story’s protagonists?). But if you disregard that, the writing itself isn’t more difficult that what I’ve encountered so far. The text density is definitely higher though.
Yesterday I read this week’s IBC section and then I was running short of time and energy, so I went for something easier and started ゲゲゲの鬼太郎. I had proposed it for the ABBC but it was judged to be too difficult. I still believe it’s way easier than, say, Takagi-san, even though the text density looks intimidating at first glance. It’s not though, there’s just increased hiragana that takes up more space, and the writing is generally as straightforward as they come.
And of course, this being a story about yokai and ghosts and monsters, there are also images like these (cartoon gore):
It’s interesting that the “monsters” are portrayed as having lived a blissful, peaceful existence for thousands of years before humans appeared and drove them into hiding and danger of extinction, just like any other animal. The monsters have a gentle, polite speech, while the humans seem rougher in their speech and behaviour, sometimes even scarier in their intent. I only read the first chapter which features 鬼太郎’s birth, so I’m looking forward to the adventures he’ll have next. 