Week 12 俺物語! ・ My Love Story! 🍰 (Absolute Beginner Book Club)

[mgevaert]

Welcome to Week 12 of 俺物語!! ・ My Love Story!!

Learn more about the Absolute Beginner Book Club here
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Week 12	November 22 2025
Start page	125
End page	142
End phrase	美肌なんですよ。。。
Last week	Week 11
Next week	Week 13
Home Thread	俺物語!!

Page numbers may differ between digital and physical copies.

Last panel

Vocabulary

Vocabulary list (Google sheets)

Please read the guidelines on the first page before adding any words.

Discussion Guidelines

Everybody should feel free to post and ask questions–it’s what makes book clubs fun! But please do not post until you are familiar with Spoiler Courtesy!

Spoiler Courtesy

Please follow these rules to avoid inadvertent ネタバレ. If you’re unsure whether something should have a spoiler tag, err on the side of using one.

1. Any potential spoiler for the current week’s reading need only be covered by a spoiler tag. Predictions and conjecture made by somebody who has not read ahead still falls into this category.

2. Any potential spoilers for external sources need to be covered by a spoiler tag and include a label (outside of the spoiler tag) of what might be spoiled. These include but are not limited to: other book club picks, other books, games, movies, anime, etc. I recommend also tagging the severity of the spoiler (for example, I may still look at minor spoilers for something that I don’t intend to read soon).

3. Any information from later in the book than the current week’s reading (including trigger warnings that haven’t yet manifested) needs to be hidden by spoiler tags and labeled as coming from later sections.

Instructions for Spoiler Tags

Click the cog above the text box and use either the “Hide Details” or “Blur Spoiler” options. The text which says “This text will be hidden” should be replaced with what you are wishing to write. In the case of “Hide Details”, the section in the brackets that is labelled “Summary” can be replaced with whatever you like also (i.e, [details=”Chapter 1, Pg. 1”]).

Hide Details results in the dropdown box like below:

Example

The “Blur Spoiler” option will simply blur the text it surrounds.

This is an example of the “Blur Spoiler” option.

Posting Advice

• When asking for help, please mention the page number, and check before posting that your question hasn’t already been asked. As the threads get longer, it becomes more convenient to use the Search function, which is located in the upper right corner of the forum. It is the magnifying glass which is near your profile picture! The best way to search is usually to type part of the sentence you are confused about, and select “in this topic”. This will show you all posts within the current thread which has that string of text.

• Be sure to join the conversation! It’s fun, and it’s what keeps these book clubs lively! There’s no such thing as a stupid question! We are all learning here, and if the question has crossed your mind, there’s a very good chance it has crossed somebody else’s also! Asking and answering questions is a great learning opportunity for everyone involved, so never hesitate to do so!

Proper Nouns

Name	Reading	Image	Notes
剛田 猛男	ごうだ たけお		Main character
大和 凛子	やまと りんこ		Main character’s love interest
砂川 誠	すなかわ まこと		Main character’s best friend
砂川 愛	すなかわ あい		Sunakawa’s older sister

Discussion Questions

What surprised you about the reading this week?

Participation

Will you be reading along with us this week?

• I’m reading along
• I have finished this part
• I’m still reading the book but I haven’t reached this part yet
• I’m reading this book after the club has finished
• I’m no longer reading the book

[ChristopherFritz]

Have you been noticing Yamato’s use of pronouns?

Yamato and 私 and うち

Following the incident on the train (page 19), Yamato says:

Notable: She’s referring to herself with 私 and using the ます verb form, both polite speech. (Note: 私 can also be casual for females, but ます shows the whole line is polite.)

When she visits Takeo’s house (pages 28 and 29), she says:

She’s using 私 and です, but then switches to 帰る (casual).

Likewise, when she calls her cell phone left behind in Takeo’s room (page 31):

She’s still using です when speaking with Takeo.

Later, she meets Takeo and Suna in the park to get her cell phone back (page 33), during which time Takeo says she doesn’t need to use polite speech with them:

She switches over, but is still using 私 (page 34):

However, something changes the moment Takeo asks if she would bake something else for him (page 40).

Perhaps not paying attention due to her level of excitement, Yamato refers to herself with うち.

Following a later meeting at the park (page 55), Yamato says:

When offering to pay Suna back for the drink he bought (page 60), she slips again:

Then there’s the random steel beam incident (page 67):

Once everyone’s safe (page 69):

After Suna confirms to Yamato that Takeo doesn’t have a girlfriend (page 84):

Then her visit to Suna’s room (page 90):

And attempting to play match-maker (page 95):

This week, we see an e-mail Yamato is writing to Takeo (page 124):

And when she’s speaking to someone new (page 128), an occassion to use polite speech:

Then the mishap (page 129), where she’s likely not thinking before speaking:

During a nighttime walk (page 133):

Then Yamato gets a little emotional (page 142), so although she’s speaking politely:

Keep an eye out as you work your way through this and the following weeks!

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Want to know more about pronoun selection and usage? Here’s a video:

How Japanese Choose Their Pronoun

[mgevaert]

this is really fun! I hadn’t really thought of うち as a pronoun at all, more to refer to one’s house.

[RebBlue]

thoughts both last week and this week

おとこ with 漢 kanji emphasises the manliness. Which is weird because he’s talking about 砂川. Maybe more gentlemanliness.

What the fuck is going on with 砂川’s sister that’s having an actual breakdown upon hearing 猛男 has a girlfriend?

So, we have all that going on, and 大和 was going to ask something but deleted it and replaced it with overly cuteness.

Oh! He called her pure and she looks sad. So probably, this is earlier when he said he wouldn’t touch her until she was an adult, and I just rolled my eyes a bit but actually we didn’t see her reaction to that, and I think she does want their relationship to be more physical so she does not consider herself pure. And if that’s the part 猛男 likes, then that’s going to be a whole misunderstanding thing.

[feralfuton]

I have one question for this week:

Page 127

女性 is given a furigana of ひと but I know the reading from WaniKani as じょせい
Even on my keyboard if I type ひと I don’t see any options to select 女性 but when I type じょせい it’s the first choice. Is this a furigana typo in my version of this book or is there a reason for this?

I pulled up the Jisho page and it shows にょしょう as an alternate reading, and the expected kanji shows up right away when I type it. But no ひと on the Jisho page, so I’m at a loss why they chose that reading in the book…. Or why they didn’t just use 人 as the kanji if she really was supposed to say ひと

[RebBlue]

Usually this is where the furigana is what is actually said aloud, but the kanji gives what the character is thinking, or an extra layer of meaning, or something more descriptive. For 女性ひと it’s like he says person, but inside his brain he’s thinking woman.

[feralfuton]

Thanks! That makes sense, I’ve seen it a couple of other times where the furigana didn’t match the kanji but I don’t remember what it was. I’ll keep that in mind in case I see it again

[mgevaert]

I remember this being a sorta artistic touch in Cardcaptor Sakura (i.e. the furigana for 水 being the katakana ワテリ for “watery”)?