📚📚 Read every day challenge - Spring 2022 🌸 🌱

I ended up reading the rest of the series, and it turns into something quite different, but with some bits that were actually quite unpleasant. And definitely not kids’ stuff anymore! But apart from a couple of volumes, the pattern of only small amounts of speech does generally continue. I think I was glad I read it, but there were several points where I considered stopping.

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You raise an interesting topic. In fact I wanted to make a thread about that at some point, but for some reason I haven’t (yet?). How do readers choose what to read next? Favourite authors and favourite genres are an obvious answer, recommendations and awards are another. I use all of those, but I feel like I may be missing out on a lot more worthwhile content that isn’t as prominently featured - the criteria for awards are not necessarily the same criteria I would use for evaluating a book, and the Japanese-reading community (outside of Japan) is small enough that the same recommendations go around again and again without a lot of new input. Amazon reviews and native sites about reading would be another way to choose books from a wider pool, but this again isn’t perfect. I’ve easily spent endless hours looking for what to read next, and even those endless hours are not always fruitful. And it doesn’t help that sometimes I’m in the mood to read something incredibly specific and have no way to look for it. Like now that I’ve been looking for “horror” recommendations. I think that what I mean may be a vaguely menacing atmosphere, a story that makes me feel vaguely trapped, a hint of something unexplainable just at the edge of one’s vision, a very vague, very abstract terror, while life continues as normal? I’ve used so many words, and it’s still not clear what I’m looking for, so how on earth would I go about finding something like that? I think there was a website at some point that tried to solve this with English language books, using keywords and associations based on mood and content, but when I tried it its database wasn’t large enough to be worthwhile, and I’ve now even forgotten what it was, if it even still exists.
There’s also the bookshop method: Pick a book from the shelf because the cover or the title caught your attention, read a random paragraph, decide to get it. I used to do it all the time in my paper book days. For some reason, it’s not as easy to do online? And I unfortunately have no way to visit a Japanese bookstore at the moment. Not to mention that I still haven’t quite decoded how Japanese book covers work. Some look too childish, or too pulpy, in my eyes, yet the actual books are anything but. I can usually more or less guess at the content and quality of an English book by the cover (with a large margin of error of course), not so with Japanese books so far.

TLDR: So many books, so little time, and choosing books is hard! :grin:

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Yes, it took quite a few turns already, in these three volumes. You think you know where the story is going, but then it surprises you again and again (not always pleasantly, but it’s that kind of story). I wouldn’t mind some spoilers on how it continues, if it’s okay with you. :slight_smile:

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Not sure how helpful this is for folks whose media experiences are very different from mine, but I’ve had absolutely no trouble finding things that I want to read. I have the opposite problem, actually :sweat_smile:.

If you’re interested in manga, the Bookwalker freebies thread is a great place to find stuff that might be of interest, and since it’s free, you can easily drop a series if it turns out not to be to your taste.

Other than that, I’ve also had some success searching in Japanese for recommendations. When I discovered the 大人絵本 medium, I searched the phrase in Japanese and then skimmed reviews (in Japanese) and chose a few books that looked interesting. The better your Japanese, the more luck you’ll have fine-tuning your searches and asking for more specific stuff, probably.

I also recommend following Japanese fans and/or content creators who are into your favorite genres on twitter. Most of my personal to-read list has come from following people in the Japanese pro wrestling community. I’ve seen wrestler autobiographies that I want to read, magazine interviews on topics related to wrestling and not, manga recommendations that look interesting, even a 大人絵本, haha. It’s the same way I find out about many cool books and such in English. If you find people that share your personal tastes, you’ll get loads of great recommendations that are much more likely to be books that you’ll enjoy.

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Warning: spoilers re Happiness volumes 4 onwards!

Summary

So there are a few surprising turns in volume 4, but nothing that particularly shakes things up until near the end. Volume 5 focuses more on Gosho, and near the end is where things take a sudden leap with a major time skip. From here on, the characters are all essentially adults.

The focus of the story then moves away from Okazaki and Nora, actually for quite some time. Volumes 7 and 8 were my least favourite with some quite unpleasant scenes. Edit: the main thing being a major character being tortured. Also some flashbacks showing animal cruelty among other things. Actually not much in the way of sex scenes, except in vol 4.

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Thanks! You’ve kept your spoilers very general (in case someone else considers taking a look) and I can say I’m intrigued… I assume, judging from what you said and some panels in the beginning, that there will be sex scenes, possibly weird ones, later on?


In order to stop derailing this thread, I made a thread on choosing new books to read here:

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This sounds like the gothic genre to me (it isn’t all romances, although perhaps many are). So maybe with a potential english label for the genre, you can find recommendations? Although not sure how you’d get them in Japanese. Sorry. :bowing_woman:

I did exactly the same back in my paperback days (for English books). And I still did this a bit while browsing BookOff for manga (while I was in Japan).

I get more or less all my recommendations for books in Japanese from this forum. Across the REDC threads, the 多読 extensive reading thread, book club picks and nominations, and random recommendation threads, I feel like I’ve seen a pretty wide selection of books (across many genres and such).

As to how to choose what to read next, when it comes to Japanese books I’m limited by my current knowledge. So I pick among the easiest ones I own (mostly), and I’m waiting with the more difficult ones. I also read slow enough that I don’t have to choose new books and such so often. And I can always continue the series I’ve started.

When it comes to my reading in general. I’m at a bit of a loss too. But I tend to pick books from authors I’ve read and liked in the past. And for unknown authors, they tend to be recommendations from friends or from book bundles (like game bundles, you get a lot of books on a theme/genre from (mostly) different authors).

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I found one of my favourite series – ビブリア古書堂の事件手帖 – like that. I was wandering through the bookshop in a random Japanese shopping mall and picked it up based on the cover (that, and books with a theme about books or bookshops are something I like).

Browsing Japanese books is definitely harder for me though – it requires more time and effort to scan titles, read back-of-book blurbs, flip through opening sections, and so on.

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Oh. Based on your edit, I’d better not continue with the series, it’s the one thing I can’t stomach…Thanks for the warning!

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Yes - it made me seriously consider stopping, I’m glad I continued from where I got to as it does actually wrap up in a satisfactory way.

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Yes, it’s possible. I had tried looking at the gothic genre before (not in Japanese), but it seemed to me that romance and religion was much more prevalent than I’d like. I’ll look into it again at some point.

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Depending on when you did that last, you might find a lot more on the market (especially in the ebook market). The indie revolution have hit books (just like it hit music) from when the kindle came out. This means that most genres have expanded, as in books that wouldn’t have been published before because ideas like “gothic is only romance” are now getting published.

I can’t say if this has happened to gothics to be fair, because gothic is not my genre. :sweat_smile: But the possibility certainly exists, and I know it has happened to a lot of other genres. With new sub-genres coming into being every few months (previously I would have said new sub-genres seemed to come every day).

Being an author, I’m kinda plugged into what is happening in the publishing industry. :sweat_smile:

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Jun 27, Mon of Week 1 of Summer :beach_umbrella: (end-of-Spring :cherry_blossom:) 2022’s listing

Technically, I am planning for Week 1 of Summer Challenge, but I am posting in this topic for now.

  • 1 volume of manga
    • Happiness from Vol.3 (started from around 40%)
  • Death Note Vol.3 Ch.19 ( 屈辱(くつじょく) )
  • 進撃の巨人 Ch.2
  • JoJo Part 2 Vol.3/4 of monochrome version – solitary Caesar arc (from 2/6 to 6/6)
  • Considered
    • SHADOWS HOUSE Vol.1 (from 34%) to 66%++
    • SPY x FAMILY vol.2 – so that I can watch more Anime (EP.2)
    • A chapter of Night Cafe (or any novel)
      • 妖怪の子預かります Vol.1 from Ch.1
      • Night Cafe Vol.1 Ch.10

Unplanned extra materials

  • Manga
    • (21%) うらら迷路帳 Vol.1
  • Novel
    • 妖怪の子預かります Vol.1 Ch.1
Fonts / Pictorial differences
  • 焔王(えんのう) - it’s in my tabs for a while from JoJo’s AC/DC arc
    • 焔 is an alternate Kanji for 炎 – 「炎」が書きかえ字。
    • And, yeah, I stopped caring that AC/DC is supposed to be spelt as Eisidisi – official spelling is hard to be remembered, anyway.
教科書体 Actual text
焔-教科書体 焔-標準字体
:beach_umbrella:
第1週目 27 :writing_hand: 28 :school: 29 :school: 30 :school: 01 02 :heavy_check_mark: 03
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June 27

Reread the next 7 pages of Zenitendou. It didn’t feel as hard today. So probably the heat and a bit of tiredness did play in yesterday. Also, maybe a bit of boringness too, because the first few pages of the story is mostly set up, and once you know that, that bit can be a bit boring.

Will be cool to read the first story over 3 days instead of a week or so (would have been longer if I didn’t make a huge effort to read the last 8ish pages in one go).

So it means I’ll be done with the first story again tomorrow, and then only have a couple of days before summer challenge starts (as well as Orange book club. :tangerine: Come join us!). Will have to decide if I immediately start story two or maybe relax with Yotsuba& for a couple of days.

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:tiger2: :books: The June Tanuki Den: Date 20220627 :cherry_blossom: :raccoon:

No Longer Tanuki Progress: 53.43%

Finished chapter/note 2, now onto chapter/note 3, part 1!

:seedling: Japanese found in the tall grass :seedling:

Learnthings

冷汗三斗「れいかんさんと」ー Breaking into a cold sweat when embarrassed/scared
静謐「せいひつ」ー Peace; tranquillity
駈引き「かけひき」ー Bargaining; haggling (more common to see as: 駆け引き)
侮蔑「ぶべつ」ー Scorn; disdain; contempt
「かもめ」ー Common gull; seagull
我楽多「がらくた」ー Junk; rubbish; odds and ends (usually written in katakana)

Forms
大袈裟 = 大げさ「おおげさ」(Exaggerated; grandiose)
贋 = 偽「にせ」(Fake; phony; bogus)
聯想 = 連想「れんそう」(association; being reminded of)

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June 27th!

Today was a rough day at work. I’m half of a two man team at my company, and the other half is on holiday this week. If today is anything to go by its going to be a long week :sweat_smile:

But I still managed to do a little bit of reading this evening! I read Chapter 12 of Hana ni Arashi, which means I finished the first volume. It was very sweet, and I’m definitely going to read the next volume too. The simple language and short chapters make it a really nice read for days like today.

(Home Post)

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Summary post :bookmark:

June 27th :seedling:

・ 詩的私的ジャック - Jack the Poetical Private (23% → 27%)

Finished chapter 3! This is going smoother than expected o:

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In English, I just go by whatever I’m in the mood to read and choose from my huge collection of books that I’ve bought for free or at a very low price. If that fails, then I go to my favourite authors and either re-read their series and read the latest book by them.

In Japanese, I use anime to decide. I’m still a beginner so focussing on books with plots that I know in English is easier for me.

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(📚📚 Read every day challenge - Spring 2022 🌸 🌱 - #12 by DIO-Berry)

  • ジョジョの奇妙な冒険 17巻

6/27
39 - 68

I had in my head that I was starting from 30, so I thought I had read a lot more… :sob:

It was a good time reading, I pretty much only stopped because I needed to get some sleep.

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June 27 :cherry_blossom: Home Post

I read chapter 11 of 海辺(うみべ)のカフカ today; content aside it was a pretty easy read, so that was nice. I think it’s now officially the furthest I’ve gotten into an actual book, so yay for that :tada: the power of sticking with book clubs!

That was most of my reading today, but I played a couple of バディミッションBOND side stories too. It’s really cool having these one-shot stories further exploring the characters and their dynamics and backstories and such, very much up my alley :grin:

some BOND stuff

Hmmm doubt? ルーク didn’t call him out on it bc it was a pretty angsty situation all around talking about アーロン’s childhood and worrying about the other kids what with the ongoing unrest and just… yeah but like he’s definitely saved ルーク more than once, so either he’s a liar or ルーク’s family now, either way you’re a sap アーロン! Not that that’s news lmao, no matter how much he wants to deny it :eyes:

A sap, he had fun playing the big villain :')

Genuinely some of the most difficult parts reading-wise have been ルーク and モクマ’s side stories because they’re just ~gourmands~ and talk about yummy food and make me hungry, but like using super specific food words I absolutely don’t know :joy: This one isn’t bad really but it is ルーク going all food network on us but with like Hinata sound effects lmao:

ルーク is precious :')

OH this is completely unrelated to anything I read today, but another realization I had from the plot stuff at the big concert: the whole thing with ルーク’s dad’s gun that he made, that people were making fun of as pointless because it didn’t do any real damage… it’s because of the rat bruises… he needed a way to fight against normal people turned feral without hurting them… it’s all coming together :eyes: :eyes:

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