It is a lot, huh! I think at some point I just accepted 積ん読 into my heart indefinitely - I heard about bookwalker and got into ebooks after that post though so the rate of increase probably slowed volume-wise at least…
Did you mention lgbtq+ themes and pro wrestling out of particular interest for those things?
If so, probably my favorite things I’ve read so far in Japanese related to lgbtq+ themes are:
- 不可解なぼくのすべてを, a warm and pretty easy to read manga about a maid cafe that’s a haven for trans/non-binary/questioning people.（there was a book club for this）
- しまなみ誰そ彼, a very airy and pretty manga set in Onomichi about a boy questioning his sexuality finding potential solace in a sort of like, safe house run by a mysterious stranger.
- ストップ!! ひばりくん! and らんま1/2 I guess? but both are definitely much much more like, lgbtq+ adjacent in a chaotic maybe accidental 80s comedy sort of way not actually by way of directly being about that or handling gender or sexuality at all well necessarily. (but I do like them a lot)
- (うちの息子はたぶんゲイ and 弟の夫 aren’t necessarily my favorites but they’re beginner friendly so I though I’d mention them just in case they strike a chord with somebody! They’re fun!)
(there’s stuff on the shelves in the picture that I still haven’t read – like Banana Fish – so not mentioning something shouldn’t be interpreted as a slight against it by the way…)
Somewhat embarrassingly the only one (almost) of the wrestling books I’ve actually read so far is Mayu Iwatani’s 引きこもりでポンコツだった私が女子プロレスのアイコンになるまで, which I did enjoy! I’ve kept decent pace with the weekly magazines since then though and still post long-windedly about them in the wrestling thread.
If you were asking about general favorites, I suppose my favorite novel (so far) has been the atmospheric and highly detailed mystery novel 獄門島 by Seishi Yokomizo (which there was a book club for too), and my favorite manga has been ドンジョン飯, an RPG-tinged (but non-isekai) fantasy series about eating monsters that develops seamlessly in a cool way from goofy comedy to full-on adventure (that still has cooking and goofy comedy), which compelled me to start following the magazine it’s published in, ハルタ, which has itself truly been a highlight for me and I post about it frequently in the extensive reading thread.
Really in the grand scheme of things I still haven’t read very much though! Lots to look forward to!