2024 Bingo Reading Challenge ☑️

Update!
You would think I was avoiding Bingos on purpose.

I did read some things with the intention to add them in, but upon finishing them realized they weren’t as clear fits as I’d thought.

The only new one I want to mention is もらってください. The one on the “cheapest” spot. I bought it on impulse because of the unusual art style and it’s now my favorite comedy. It is so perfectly unserious. And yet the tender moments still hit. Highly recommend.

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So, that “prize winner” looks really pretty, but I see from your library you only gave it 3*. Was it just meh or did you have any reason for that rating?

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It is definitely pretty.

I felt there was no plot outside the romance and their relationship issues were not complex enough to be stretched out for so long. It’s a problem I have with most school romances, but I thought them being in college made it safe. If you like school romances, childhood friend plots, and nostalgic teenage drama you probably will enjoy it.

To sum it up, I just thought it was boring.

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How did you make your bingo so pretty?

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Thanks! I made it in PowerPoint. My post is a screenshot of a slide. Switching out images is super convenient on PowerPoint, so that’s why I’m using it.

I’d share the template but I think most people would prefer Word. The features are about the same.

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Wow, that looks really nice for Powerpoint! I assumed you were using some fancy image editing software or something.

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Share away! I think it’s really cool and would like to use it next year for mine! No point in joining for 2024 anymore, I think… I was a bit overwhelmed to at first so I’ll mentally prepare for next year!

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I’m late getting it set up but we now have a 2025 thread in the all languages part of the forums. :blush:

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I was super late too. I’m excited to have a whole year next time.

Here’s a download link:

Double click on the gray boxes and paste covers from your clipboard like this:

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Lol thanks! Those programs are way too advanced for me. I’m happy with my limited freedom.

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I picked this one up to use as my “nonhuman protagonist” square. Only read 15 pages so far, but it seems a fairly straightforward style to read. Incidentally it turns out to be “story of an Asian Giant Hornet”. Wikipedia says “some popular and sensationalist media outlets in Japan also began referring to this wasp as satsujin suzumebachi (殺人スズメバチ, literally, “murder hornet”)” and the protagonist has indeed killed another wasp already in the first 15 pages :slight_smile:

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I got my “read in a single day” square! I bought 夢について | L30?? specifically for this purpose because of the low page count and because I know Yoshimoto Banana writes in a straightforward style. The nominal page count is 156, but the book is a series of 24 essays which are all about 5 pages each and have a full page illustration each, so when you account for the illustration pages and the pages at the end of essays with only a few lines of text, I reckon the actual full-pages-of-text count is more like 120.

I started this first thing in the morning as I wasn’t sure how much time it would take, but after I’d read the first five or so essays it seemed like they took me about five minutes or so each and so I did the rest in a relatively relaxed way, taking breaks and pauses, and still finished around mid afternoon.

In terms of actual content, reading to a deadline isn’t the best way to appreciate it :slight_smile: There are some interesting or funny bits in there, like the essay where the author is cleaning out her old room at her parents’ house and looking at all the things she wrote and owned at the time and realising wow, past-me was the same person and yet also really different to current-me… and then finding a big box of seal-themed goods and plushies and stuff and going “wtf was I thinking as a child” and

「自分はこの家でいったい何をしていたんでしょう。ごめんなさい、こんな変な人間と暮らさせてしまって。」とあやまったら、
「変わった子だとは思ってたけどねえ、オットセイのものばかり買って。」と言われました。

and there’s one at the end which is basically a ghost story which I liked. Most of them I didn’t have a strong feeling about, but that’s partly I think because I’m not an enthusiast for the “personal essay” genre.

So I guess I recommend it if you also are looking for an easy to read short book for a “read in a single day” challenge, or if you want something which is all very short predictable length pieces so you can do one a day or something.

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I managed to finish マスカレード・ホテル which nicely fills my “workplace setting” square - but I’m carefully avoiding getting the next bingo, it seems :rofl:

Also, I realized that the book I wanted to read for the “added to Natively” square is way too hard for me to reliably finish it this year (and also I’m reading it with one of my language partners which means that we don’t have much time for reading actually, and when we’re reading we need to discuss the contents a lot so progress is even slower :rofl:), and so I decided to read 葉桜の日 | L30?? instead in order to fill that square. It consists of two short stories, and so far (~30 pages into the first one) it is very smooth sailing, and I like the atmosphere of the story despite having no clue at all where this will lead to. In a certain way it actually reminds me of キッチン | L30 so far - would be nice if it continues along these lines.

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Card

I did it! Which means I can finally create my bingo card! Because that’s totally how this is supposed to be done, right? :sweat_smile: Although it did provide a good opportunity to look back at what I read this year.

I’m glad I took part in the challenge. It encouraged me to step out of my comfort zone a bit and try out new stuff, which was fun. And I even managed to stick to my rule of no manga/short stories :slightly_smiling_face:

Details
  1. Read something with no reviews/gradings/ratings on Natively - 満願 | L36
  2. Read something at a higher Natively level than what you’ve read so far - 64 上 | L39
  3. Read something from the free samples/something you can read for free (such as syosetsu, kakuyomu, tonarinoyj, etc) - 何者 | L34
  4. Finish a series (can be either one you are already reading or you can start a new one) - 1Q84 BOOK3〈10月‐12月〉後編 | L35
  5. Read something that has won an award - 改良 | L29
  6. Read an author you’ve never read before - 満月珈琲店の星詠み | L31
  7. Read a book with a non human protagonist - 旅猫リポート | L30
  8. Read a book that you added to Natively - 数学ガールの秘密ノート/式とグラフ 数学ガールの秘密ノートシリーズ | L27
  9. Read a book with a bad cover / read a book you bought or wanted to read despite the cover - 江田島殺人事件 (ノン・ポシェット) | L36
  10. Join/Participate in a Book Club - シャドウ | L31
  11. Read the book that has been in your 積読/TBR pile the longest - デビルサマナー 葛葉ライドウ 対 死人驛使 | L36
  12. Read a debut (an author’s first book, whether they’ve written more or not) - 六番目の小夜子 | L30
  13. Read a book chosen randomly by lucky draw or with a qualifier from the qualifier list (see below) from your 積読/TBR pile - FLESH & BLOOD 1 | L36
  14. Read 1 vol. or story (from a graded reader, for example) in a single day - コンビニ人間 | L29
  15. Read something non-fiction - 暗号解読(上) | L32
  16. Read something where the setting is a workplace (any occupation is ok) - わたし、定時で帰ります。: ライジング | L35
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So I’ve decided I need to sit down and come to terms with the fact that my reading habits just are not aligned with my current bingo goal of “only count backlogged items”, so for these last couple of months of the year, I’m going to relax that requirement. So in that spirit…

Read a book chosen randomly: BROTHERS CONFLICT 1 | L25
A book you added to Natively: Changing 冥府の王の神隠し | L29 to 流沙の記憶 | L35
A book w/ a non-human protagonist: 冥府の王の神隠し | L29

Still no bingos, but being able to cross off two more squares feels really nice. I have eight squares left, which is a real stretch in terms of getting a blackout by the end of the year, but I’m still gunning for one or two bingos, at least.

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Finished 風の中のマリア | L30?? so now I have a completed board!

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You could read a debut, something in a workplace setting and a book with a bad cover and also finish a series, and you’d be getting a prize for crossing off the most squares while still avoiding a bingo :joy:

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Here’s an animated-gif version of that (mostly produced as an experiment in how well chatgpt did at writing python scripts – the end result was about 70% chatgpt, 10% bugs fixed by chatgpt when I pointed them out, and 15% me fixing the last bugs by hand):

bingo_animation

(yes, the script has messed up the aspect ratio of the covers. oh well)

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