I think I will do something similar; I won’t put F&B 14 in a spot for now, but keep it in my pocket for later use if I need to shuffle things around. 
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I finished 不能共 | L29, which I am using for the “Book I added” space. I originally nominated this for the BL club a while back, and after reading it, I am really glad that it didn’t win since it was beyond crazy. 
I had a blast reading it, though!
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Well… I just finished it and let me tell you that end sucker punched me. I didn’t expect 吾輩は猫である to make me cry, but here we are.
Reading itself was a lot more enjoyable than 10 years ago, that’s for sure. I’ll leave whatever other thoughts I have for the review I may or may not write.
Anyway, cat protagonist, longest TBR, and highest level.
Just one more book and I’m done with this grid. I even picked it from the library in advance. BUT I need some thoughts ending stuff first, so I’m gonna try that level 45 LN because I don’t believe believe that number anyway.
Also, I reserve the right to throw it away at any moment due to that suspiciously underaged-looking yet topless girl in the color illustrations at the beginning of the volume. That doesn’t bode well.
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My headcanon for the ending is that after the cat is done with his overwrought goodbye cruel world soliloquising, somebody passes by the barrel and unceremoniously fishes him out and dumps him on the ground. It would be entirely in character…
Coincidentally the ending of 漱石先生の事件簿 猫の巻 | L34 suggests that the author of that book agreed with me.
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Feb 08:
join/participate in a book club: 天気の子
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I finished my first prose paperback in Japanese. 10分で読める伝記 (2年生)・10 Minute Biographies for 2nd graders. I’ve had this on my tbr pile since March 2021, so a very sweet victory. I copied those who added the covers to the bingo chart 
I wrote a nostalgic retrospective on my log at WK
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After a long time, here is my second Korean book of the year: 바보 동자 | L21. I’ve technically read other books since January, but then they were mostly small picture books, as well as novels that I haven’t finished yet.
This one is technically also a picture book, but it does have a lot more text and vocab than your regular picture book so I’m counting it. This was a pretty enjoyable read, and it turns out, when you add children to a story about monks, funny things happen!
Category is: new to me author!
So far:
- 흥부전 | L17 (longuest in TBR)
- 바보 동자 | L21 (new author)
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I crossed off 3 prompts:
- Read 1 vol in one day 宇宙を駆けるよだか 1 | L21
- takes place at a 神社 玉藻の恋 | L19
- not translated into your native language 雨の日も、晴れ男 | L25
bingos summarized
- 1 vol. or story in a single day 宇宙を駆けるよだか 1 | L21
- added to Natively by you 猫嬢ムーム(1) | L17??
- longest in 積読/TBRpile 違国日記 1 | L26
- takes place at a 神社 玉藻の恋 | L19
- debut work https://learnnatively.com/book/e85b4bd246/
- no reviews / gradings / ratings トッカン―特別国税徴収官― | L32
- bad cover 夏と花火と私の死体 | L28
- not translated into your native language 雨の日も、晴れ男 | L25
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So, today I figured I should check out which of my 積読 books I should read as the random pick, and the answer I got was… drumroll
Anyways, I guess that’s what you gotta do to clean up your book pile 
Please look forward to my report on the bear-cub fun!
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This could also probably count as your “read in a day” book 
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I thought so too Will definitely give that a try.
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Oh! I want to join it too!
Mostly I’m going to read light novels and a few regular novels there and here~
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I finished 2 books this week:
- Reading Road - “no reviews” (which now has my review)
- ちいさな森のオオカミちゃん 2 - “finished a series”
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I finished 迷い猫オーバーラン! 拾ってなんていってないんだからね!! | L30?? today, as my “been in the TBR pile the longest” book: I’m pretty sure it’s been there over a decade. I stand by my opinion that it’s not a very good book, since its characters are mostly a thin bundle of cliches (especially bad when the book is more about character interaction than plot), and juvenile male humour isn’t my thing. But it did settle down a bit after a rocky start, and the ending was surprisingly heartwarming. (The LN series made it to twelve volumes, so it clearly has an audience who liked it. Maybe if you like harem-ish comedy you might like it?)
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Read some more manga recently. Almost a bingo, just got to find something free… maybe とつくにの少女 1 | L21?
- Setting is a workplace: スーパーの裏でヤニ吸うふたり 1 | L25 - discovered the first volume was free for a limited time and binged it. I really liked it! Not usually a fan of romance but it helped that they were actually working adults and Sasaki’s exhaustion is a mood.
- Oldest book in TBR list: 大海原と大海原 1 | L20 - gotta be Wadanohara, which is the very first native material I tried to read back in 2021 (thanks to the wanikani ABBC) - I only got through ch 2 before I stopped my japanese studying again. This time around I read most of it in a day, and might continue with vol 2.
Funnily enough, the reason why I even decided to join the Wadanohara book club despite not having studied Japanese for a while was because I was really surprised there was a manga adaptation - I’m pretty sure it’s based off of the RPGMaker game which I watched a let’s play (in English) of a long time ago!
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Category: Workplace Setting
Date Completed: Feb. 18, 2024
Title: マグメル深海水族館 1
Stats: Manga, 201 pages, Natively Level 24
Notes: This one took me a bit longer to read while I juggled it with life, uni research, and my first foray into vertical-text novels (it’s been rough ahaha). But マグメル was perfect to read alongside my hectic days, being a gentle slice-of-life about working in an undersea aquarium. There was just a hint of deeper plot points, but not so intense that there was trouble picking it back up after a few days’ absence. I learned lots of names of deep-sea creatures while falling in love with the aquarium through the eyes of the main character („• ֊ •„) If you’re looking for a kind and gentle read that is both beautiful and otherworldly, I definitely recommend this one. (Thank you @pyororon for rec’ing this to me!)
I’m so close to my first bingo row!!
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It somehow feels like I haven’t updated here for ages. I just finished 掏摸(スリ) | L31 (learnnatively.com) and I think I’ll use it for my “has won an award” box. It has won the 4th Kenzaburo Oe prize, a prize which was awarded only 8 times, from 2007 to 2014.
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Finally back to this challenge!
I just finished 新! 店長がバカすぎて | L30??, which fits both “finish a series” (although it’s recorded separately from the first book on Natively; I have sent a feedback about it) and workplace setting. It also had no reviews/gradings and TECHNICALLY I read it over the course of 24h (I read a bit of it at the time I got it from the library, but started from 0 yesterday evening and finished it during my lunch break today). I guess that matches the definition of “in a single day” (but anyway, I just needed 3 boxes and that’s 4).
And with that, I have finished my BING(o) card!
Books:
麦ふみクーツェ | L34 New to me author, added to natively by me, in a single day, award winner, no reviews/ratings
私小説―from left to right | L40 Non fiction, random from my TBR, new to me, “for free” (from the library)
痴人の愛 | L42 for free (for real), new to me author, book club, bad cover; BINGO IN ONE
地獄くらやみ花もなき | L31 Debut, added by me, “for free”, new to me author, (non-human protagonist?), no reviews/ratings
吾輩は猫である | L48 Highest natively level, non-human protagonist, longest in TBR (nearly 10 years!)
新! 店長がバカすぎて | L30?? finish a series (although the author hints at the end that their might be another sequel), workplace setting, in a single “day”, “for free”, no reviews/ratings.
Time to make a new bingo card 
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Okay, here it is! After BING(o), comes BONG(o). Because bing bong. I am very funny.
I used all the prompts and all TBR qualifiers. On top of the plain “random from your TBR”, I added “ultimate random”, that is, picked randomly from the entirety of the Natively library. In my case (because I rolled those dice already) that means the book here. (I had to do so to remove a redundancy but still get 64 prompts)
Anyway, I’m planning to do this one vanilla, one entry per box. I’m allowing myself to use anything (novel, LN, manga) BUT not the ones I have already used in the previous grid.
I guess that means I have to fill some boxes already, with the other things I read this year…
Vol2: 葬送のフリーレン 2 | L26
Book club: 今日からマのつく自由業! | L33
New to me author: 東京ヒゴロ 1 | L28
In a single day: 蟲師 1 | L29
Contains a character that speaks a dialect: 神様はじめました (series) | L28 (putting the series because I don’t remember in which volume she appears first)
Bad cover: TRPGプレイヤーが異世界で最強ビルドを目指す 2 ~ヘンダーソン氏の福音を | L40
Chosen for me: BANANA FISH 1 | L33
Edit: Published 2020~ TRPGプレイヤーが異世界で最強ビルドを目指す 1 ~ヘンダーソン氏の福音を~ | L40 (that means I am using different volumes from the same series twice, but I guess that’s legit?)
Edit2: Wait, I am dumb. 神社⛩️ 神様はじめました 第1巻 | L28 (I feel like I need to specify the dialect one more, in that case)
Edit3: 0~1 kanji in the title BANANA FISH 2 | L33 (already used volume 1)
Edit4: with those put in the grid. I’m sure I can fill more boxes, but whatever. I don’t want to just use manga 
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