The year’s almost over and it’s time to look back.
I know we have the 多読 thread, but I really wanted to back this one as a way to “archive” the year and have something to revisit later.
Looking forward to your replies! (I’ll post mine later.)
True, it tends to get lost into the noise. The 多読 thread is quite long already.
That being said, I have read 95 books (excluding manga) so far this year, so I don’t think I’d be able to manage writing something about all of them 
I’m not even sure I’ll have the strength to copy all the comments I wrote in the 多読 thread.
I guess I’ll just post a list (probably just a screenshot from bookmeter) and comment on my favorite books.
To the best of my ability i read the first volume of One Piece. I know the story pretty much by heart anyway and pictures provide additional context but still I couldn’t make out what many speech bubbles were actually saying – but that means with many I still could!
What holds me back with reading at this point is surprisingly mostly Kanji knowledge, not grammar, where I’m about on a JLPT N4 level (at least in terms of recognition; not production). Instead of looking up vocabulary I simultaneously had the scanlated chapter open on my computer. Those are way better to learn than the official translations, because they transcribe stuff quite literally. I bought the books, so i don’t even feel guilty using pirated material as well 
It’s more than i ever read, so i consider this a huge success 
My progress is exceedingly slow but it’s progress nonetheless. It’ll be a while until i feel confident to read a ‘proper’ book though …
This year I read しろくまカフェ (1 vol), よつばと！(10 vol), 少女終末旅行 (all 6 vol), それでも歩は寄せてくる (8 vol), 極主夫道 (5 vol), SPY×FAMILY (1 vol), and Satori Reader (250ish chapters). I would say I enjoy reading all of them but If I had to pick one, probably 極主夫道 because I really like the juxtaposition of the main character’s personality and the situation he is in.
Am I satisfied with my reading progress? Absolutely yes. I started learning Japanese from zero in July this year. From knowing nothing about kana and Japanese grammar to being (somewhat) able to comprehend simple story is really rewarding, definitely seeing some improvement for the past 5 months since I started learning this language.
My next goal is to start reading novels. I already read 2 chapters of 魔女の宅急便 and intent to keep going, hopefully 1 chapter per day if I can. If anyone could recommend novel or light novel besides 魔女の宅急便 and コンビニ人間 that are quite easy for a beginner like me, that would be appreciated. Any genres are welcome! 
I was a huge fan of the Rurouni Kenshin series when it aired in the mid 90s, so I couldn’t resist purchasing the whole manga series during my last trip in Japan.
Kanji recognition and reading has gotten easier with WK but I struggle with the levels of in/formality. The other aspect I find challenging is that the series is historic fiction so there are plenty of terms that I vaguely remember…
A work in progress!
Ive finished 48 books this year and some manga and games that I won’t even bother to count.
I really enjoyed 今夜世界からこの恋が消えても and 告白. 彼女に浮気されていた俺が小悪魔な後輩に懐かれています was pretty good too and is probably the series I will be following closest.
Overall, I’d say it was a good year. Definitely coulda gotten more done, but I made the personal transition of viewing myself as someone who reads japanese to someone who is literate in the written japanese language which is pretty big to me.
Yes, it was. Lots of fun books and learning.
I started my first graded reading book in May and finished it soon after.
Since then I have been doing a chapter a day of からかい上手の高木さん and am currently on volume #9.
Planning on reading my first non-manga book next year.
To be honest, I only started reading from October onwards but manage to read through all 15 volumes of Yotsubato (with the help of the trusty vocabulary sheet)
I would say that it was amazing knowing that I could finally read manga in Japanese after studying for a few months. My hard work had paid off Furthermore, I could read in informal speech
Not really, trying to move away from manga and onto light novels, though the transition is a bit too hard
Yes
All the best for 2022 everyone 
One picture book, two manga and half a novel. (The second Doggy Detectives book, Book 1 & 2 of Takagi-san, and Kiki.)
I enjoyed reading 魔女の宅急便 (Kiki’s Delivery Service) the most, even though it took me far longer than the rest, was more time consuming and exhausted me at first.
Despite not managing to meet my goal of finishing Kiki before the end of this year, I am in fact satisfied with how much I’ve progressed in my reading ability. In January, I started the second Doggy Detectives book as my first ever book along with the ABBC, and in April I began Kiki only just able to read one page at a time (it took me half an hour on one). Due to life I barely picked it up at all for a few weeks at a time, which is why Kiki has taken me so long — nevertheless, my speed and stamina has definitely improved. I can read around four pages in half an hour now, and could probably keep going for far longer if I had the time.
I recently bought ふしぎだ菓子屋銭天堂 on Bookwalker, to read while I’m out and about. Even though I still need to heavily rely on the vocabulary sheet from the past book club, it’s surprisingly easy to understand.
Yes it was! It was the start of my reading journey, and I’m looking forward to enjoying far more books in 2022 and in the years beyond.
As I only started two month ago:
I may buy Yotsubato as well, as everyone tend to read them first.
Last year I rounded the year out with 8 books / ~2300 pages. This year I’ve managed to finish 16 books (with 2 more in progress) and 19 stand alone short stories. Total page count so far is 5235. I’m pretty happy with more than doubling my page count, especially given that I stopped reading for long stretches several times this year. 
I don’t count manga towards my reading goals/counts, but I finished 12 volumes. I also don’t count the innumerable meaning-book articles I’ve read towards my reading goals either, though.
I’d say my favorite books this year were かがみの孤城 and すべての神様の十月. My favorite short stories were 朝、人間椅子、and ゴン狐.
I’ve gotten much more comfortable with stopping reading things because I don’t enjoy them. Last year and earlier this year I pushed through a lot of stuff I didn’t like at all because “I’m learning” and now I’m comfortable enough with my reading level (which is still very much In-Progress) that I don’t make myself slog through things I don’t like.
It makes me so happy to see so many people starting reading this year. It opens up a whole new world. 
I read a few random volumes/chapters on bookwalker when free. Read Hige wo Soru Vol 1 and I want to try and finish the other 4 volumes that I own over the holidays. Also started reading more on Satori Reader since last month. I read the prologue of 君の名は, I want to finish reading it next year
My favorite book was definitely Bengoshi to 17-sai A manga about the relationship between a lawyer and a 17 year old girl. The lawyer does not want to do anything with her until she is 18 and she tries everything to convince him otherwise. It had a lot of specific vocab that I learnt very quickly because I was enjoying it so much ^^
I am really satisfied with my Japanese learning/reading journey. I started learning Japanese in May, so being able to read anything at all in Japanese is something I am really proud of. Around August I stopped reading for a while because my way of reading (writing everything down en translating sentences) was not enjoyable enough. Now I just look up words I don’t know and when I recognise grammar points I sometimes look it up. Reading with just some fast vocab searches is definitely better for me at the moment.
Yes, but I feel like I’m just starting reading more in December. I want to keep this up and next year I hope I will be able to finish more manga and at least one novel!
I started reading on a whim this year when I was trying to distract myself from studying for school.This was at the end of March. I picked up vol 1 of my pile of yotsuba volumes and just read the first chapter in pretty much one go. That was kinda the confidence boost I needed to get the ball rolling, I took a break because exams, continued from there, took another break for exams and since the start of May I read through start of December without skipping a day. I’m on a break again now, so I haven’t gone back to the reading as before, although I might read some stuff here and there still.
I read 31 volumes, 30 of those are from manga and 1 is a collection of short stories for children to get to reading. As my reading challenge kinda coincided with the one on wanikani, you can find it back there or look at my bookmeter. I read all of yotsuba, polar bear café and started spy x family to name a few. In the end I read 223 days with a streak of 188 consecutive days.
That’s only the book side. I have dabbled a little with games as well. Starting with puzzle games such as a shiritori one and various picross ones. The first meaty reading practice game is Skyward Sword, which I’m planning to finish this week. That one probably takes me 50 hours. I’m very proud to have stuck with it as it was pretty tough at the start, but I got better at reading through all the manga. Coming back to it has shown me how much progress I made in just a few months.
Aside from that I kept up with doing grammar in Tobira, which also encourages reading with at least one reading section and several short dialogues. Then there’s the bits and pieces of looking up things online, that are too small of note to list, but have added to the overall experience.
Reading took off, more than I thought it would. Kinda wanted to do the same with listening/watching, although that is still a ways off. I’m watching one anime show with JP subs at the moment whenever I’m like yeah this is a good time.
Things I learned from this year is that repeated exposure really helps and I found manga to be the easiest for me to keep reading on a regular basis. I’m definitely interested in continuing. Starting anything new can still get some getting used to. When things start making sense and the story and characters are really all guiding me forward, it becomes a great source of motivation and energy. It also humbles me, as there is still much to learn and see. There’s still more I feel like I should do with Japanese, but I know I have to take it one step at a time and also give myself the time.
So yeah 2021 has been a great year in this regard and I hope next year is no different. Have a pile of manga to go through, games I want to play and shows I wanna watch. In terms of my learning, I feel like things are just beginning. That might feel a bit discouraging to read back as it took several years to get to this point, but it’s just how it went for me. Things might be different for someone else as we are all learning at a different pace and it might take different approaches to make any sort of headway.
I only started learning Japanese at all at the beginning of June. Given that, I am extremely pleased both with my progress, and with the amount of time and effort I’ve managed to dedicate to this. Most of my reading happened after spending a couple months on Genki, too. Roughly in order (though many things were semi-simultaneous), this year I read:
Right now, with the book clubs, I’m midway through volume 3 of Ayumu, volume 1 of Mitsuboshi Colors, and volume 1 of Way of the Househusband.
On my own, I’m up to midway through case 3 on Ace Attorney (my current primary intensive studying material that I sentence mine from) and just past saving the first star on N64 Paper Mario (as a casual, no real lookups chill playthrough).
Those early volumes were rough; I’ve got a past forum post or two about how I didn’t seem to be internalizing and managing to figuring out how to really “read” when I was 3 or 4 volumes deep into Yotsubato… but over time, my confidence is growing. Ace Attorney throws out words I don’t know regularly, as everything will for ages, but it’s usually clear what’s going on, which is remarkable progress when I think back even just a couple months ago.
As for my reactions, I’ve more or less liked everything listed to some degree (ok perhaps not the Tadoku graded reader books that have pictures of eggs and stuff and just says “たまご”), but above all else, I really fell in love with Yotsubato. Despite being the go-to book for learners and something I know a lot of people drop because they’re uninterested, I just found it so heartwarming and adorable.
It’s been a good year; turns out I love reading Japanese. Excited to come back at the end of next year with a lot more than this!
Love reading all your replies!
For me 2021 was a great year for reading. I’m currently reading my 24th book, a number that far exceeds the previous years. I’ve already felt confident enough to read all kinds of works in Japanese before, but this time I’ve been able to acquire and solidy vocabulary very fast. Reading popular literature has become quite easy and belles-lettres feels more approachable now.
My favorite book of the year was definitely かがみの孤城, but I read plenty of great stories. I’ve also been able to finish many of the books I’ve been keeping for years and hope to further reduce my backlog next year.
Here’s an overview of all my 2021 books (click here for high-res version):
*includes two non-Japanese publications
# 1 – XX.01.2021 (258/258): 南の国のカンヤダ
# 2 – XX.04.2021 (282/282): Anime fantastisch
# 3 – XX.05.2021 (100/100): BFI Film Classics: Grave of the Fireflies
# 4 – 20.05.2021 (200/200): 十歳のきみへ―九十五歳のわたしから (Start: 16.05)
# 5 – 22.05.2021 ( 96/ 96): 夜市 (Start: 20.05)
# 6 – 25.05.2021 (205/205): がばいばあちゃんの笑顔で生きんしゃい！ (Start: 22.05)
# 7 – 29.05.2021 (226/226): ラストラン (Start: ??.01)
# 8 – 06.06.2021 (411/411): かがみの孤城 上 (Start: 31.05)
# 9 – 09.06.2021 (367/367): かがみの孤城 下 (Start: 07.06)
#10 – 12.06.2021 (276/276): がばいばあちゃんの幸せのトランク (Start: 10.06)
#11 – 19.06.2021 (291/291): きよしこ (Start: 13.06)
#12 – 22.06.2021 (113/113): 風立ちぬ (Start: 25.05)
#13 – 28.06.2021 ( 60/ 60): ムーンライト・シャドー (Start: 22.06)
#14 – 18.07.2021 (407/407): 魔女の宅急便その６ (Start: 02.07)
#15 – 24.07.2021 (197/197): 帰ってきたよ、ばあちゃん (Start: 20.07)
#16 – 12.09.2021 (351/351): 兎の眼 (Start: 26.07)
#17 – 02.10.2021 (203/203): かあちゃんに会いたい―がばいばあちゃんスペシャル (Start: 25.09)
#18 – 07.10.2021 (243/243): 月の森に、カミよ眠れ (Start: 02.10)
#19 – 26.10.2021 (291/291): 博士の愛した数式 (Start: 21.10)
#20 – 28.10.2021 (221/221): 俺の彼―がばいばあちゃんスペシャル (Start: 26.10)
#21 – 30.10.2021 (125/125): 推し、燃ゆ (Start: 27.10)
#22 – 30.10.2021 (205/205): 小川未明童話集 (Start: 14.09)
#23 – 02.11.2021 (214/214): 物語ること、生きること (Start: 28.10)
#24 – 08.12.2021 (455/455): 夜のピクニック (Start: 07.11)
#25 – 14.12.2021 (224/224): 明日は、いずこの空の下 (Start: 09.12)
As for manga, the year wasn’t quite as successful, but I’ve at least managed to finished 14 volumes. Among those I loved とつくにの少女 and あさドラ！ Hoping to read more next year.
*includes 4 non-Japanese publications
# 1 – ??.??..2021: あさドラ！＃３
# 2 – ??.??..2021: あさドラ！＃４
# 3 – 31.05.2021: よつばと！＃５
# 4 – 11.06.2021: とつくにの少女 ＃１
# 5 – 16.06.2021: 日の鳥 ＃１
# 6 – 18.06.2021: やさしさいっぱいの土の上で
# 7 – 19.06.2021: Sun Village (DE)
# 8 – 19.06.2021: とつくにの少女 ＃２
# 9 – 19.06.2021: とつくにの少女 ＃３
#10 – 20.06.2021: とつくにの少女 ＃４
#11 – 22.06.2021: 無限島 上
#12 – 24.06.2021: とつくにの少女 ＃５
#13 – 27.06.2021: とつくにの少女 ＃６
#14 – 29.06.2021: とつくにの少女 ＃７
#15 – 29.06.2021: Ein Zoo im Winter (DE)
#16 – 02.07.2021: 無限島 下
#17 – 07.07.2021: Die Sicht der Dinge (DE)
#18 – 02.12.2021: Tante NonNon (DE)
I finished 26 manga volumes, started some books, visual novels and games. For some reason it seems I only manage to finish manga.
Totally not satisfied even though I made lots of progress it feels
like I should be much better at japanese already. Sorry maybe I’m just dumb.
It wasn’t a bad year it’s just that I started to read too many things without finishing them. Next year I will definitely read much more. Maybe I will even finish my first book.
Everyone goes at a different pace. I repicked up Japanese 4 years ago after studying it to Genki 2 level ~10 years prior. I sometimes see people who are breezing into novels after 2 years of study from scratch. 
But that’s their life, this is mine. You can only work with the time, resources, and energy that you’ve got.
Well, I figured that, anyway, I’m not reading anything new until the end of the year, just more volumes of series I was already reading, so I might as well go ahead.
So, obviously, a lot of light novels. Toward the last quarter of last year, I found out that some light novels are actually quite fun. So I went ahead and explored. Well, for the most part, I have been disappointed BUT I have also found quite a few series I enjoyed.
Things I liked (not just light novels):
I love the characters, too. I can’t believe I only found out about this series this year. When I read the afterword of the last book of the main story, it felt like I had been reading it for ages. I found that conversation pretty interesting. It was also “fun” (?) to remember being a teenager. There’s another short story in the book, but that one was meh.
(Edit: added the 5 last books, it was a bit different than what I expected to read)
About progress, I’m definitely happy with my current level, and have been for a couple of years now. When I stopped any form of actual studying, two years ago or so, I thought I’d start again when I feel frustrated or stuck but… I guess that’s not happening?
2021 has been a good year in terms of new series and in terms of volume. It has been a bad year in terms of finding out that my tastes in terms of literature are pretty much garbage, leaning towards light novels rather than “proper” books Oh well, who cares.
Ah, it has also been a bad (or bittersweet, let’s say) year in the sense that I have reached the last volume of many series I enjoy.
I didn’t read as much as I wanted to (not surprised because not doing as much as I want of anything is kind of my theme) but I still read more than last year. Especially later half of the year I switched to watching more. I really need to catch up with my listening a bit, but it’s kind of a chore.
According to Bookmeter I finished 63 books/volumes so far this year. Most are manga volumes (58) and 5 novels/longer books with one more novel I’m going to finish before the end of the year.
Some notes about some of the manga I’ve read:
Novels/etc: (order by date of finish)
I have some other manga I’ve started and kind of stopped somewhere halfway through or so like ソラニン which is just 2 volumes, but the language isn’t all that easy, lmao.
I have a lot of started but unfinished manga in general. I don’t really like that but some are just long and lost my interest after a couple of volumes so I’m going to have to live with it, don’t want to force myself through something too uninteresting when the language can still be hard. I need to be more careful with my manga choices.
I realized that following several ongoing manga can be a chore too. Always have to make sure I read the single short chapters in time before they’re locked, but I really prefer reading a few chapters in one go so I’m trying to wait for the manga volume releases now. Takes longer until I get to read them but it’s less of a hassle.
It’s just a different kind of chore keeping up with manga as the volumes release.
I’m currently following 8 manga that are actively getting new volumes, about half of them only once a year. Since I still buy most of those series in physical version, it can be a hassle planning out when to order them in bulk.
