I’ve fallen a little behind so I just finished 初めてのお外 today. Which was probably always going to happen but I’m still reading at least!
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Vol. 4, 書字板とカルタ & 星祭りの準備
Anyone ever used カルタ? They’ve always seemed neat.
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I’ve been slacking. Finally caught up to 新商品考案. I’m done with book club reading for the week though, so now this is my main book until Friday.
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Vol. 4, 書字板とカルタ & 星祭りの準備
母さんは少し体調が良くないらしく、行きたがっていたけれど、父さんからストップがかかった。
Foreshadowing?!?! 
Was kinda meh about the last two chapters. There was some world building, but it was mostly back to slice of life. Thankfully we’re more than two thirds done at this point, so I think it can’t be toooo much more meandering before we wrap up.
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Vol. 4, 星祭り & 祭りの後
I feel like this トロンベ revelation is going to end up being really important, though it’s difficult to guess how at this point; we just have so little info on magic. It’s interesting that マイン doesn’t even really seem to be getting any magic-related education at the 神殿 either. I suppose all the temple needs is people to suck magic from, so they don’t really need to know how to use it. I wonder if she could forcefully inject magic into any plant and make it grow like crazy… Although speaking of which, does the トロンベ grow because of exposure to magic or because that’s just what it does? If it’s the former, that would mean there’s a source out in the wild it typically draws on.
7 chapters left, 5 of which are main book chapters. I’m thinking I’ll try to finish at least the main book this weekend @shitsurei, then maybe finish the two side stories Monday or something. (Though it would be nice to finish the whole thing this weekend…) I was intending to, but waking up on Saturday morning I’m feeling pretty lazy. We’ll see what happens. 
I’m surprised at how fast it feels like this book has gone compared to the others; I guess it does have about 60 less pages than book three, checking. I really enjoyed the first ~half of the book, but this second part hasn’t been as interesting; I’m hoping the last few chapters pick up.
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Well, I managed to read a few more chapters today.
Vol. 4, ルッツの行く道 & ルッツの家出
マイン’s making a fine art out of giving the 神殿 people heart attacks at this point. I really do wonder at what the 神官長 thinks of her, and what he sees their relationship as. He holds his cards very close to his chest, and it feels like we really don’t know him at all still.
I’ve been following ルッツ’s family situation with interest, so it’s a great development to see him break even more with them. I’m hoping we get a real heart-to-heart with his family, especially his father. I don’t necessarily have an opinion about him making up with them or fully leaving them, but I want to see more of the family’s perspective.
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We’re pretty booked up with seeing new places this weekend so I’ll probably be behind until the week like last time 
If you get more time feel free to keep getting out ahead of me. I’ll catch up eventually.
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Good luck with the hunt! I went to a party last night and someone came “still shaking off the flu”, so I’m officially in panic mode now. 
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Rude.
I hope you end up being fine 
Otherwise you can send them the Onion article I have saved to be passive aggressive 
NSFW language
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Vol. 4, 星祭り & 祭りの後 reply
I was wondering this, and then also remembering the part in book 2 I think, where マイン was in the forest and touched something and then it turned into トロンベ and they all commented about how it was a weird season for that to happen… like… did it suck magic from her and then start growing, or was that a coincidence? She definitely didn’t mention anything about sucking magic away, but maybe she didn’t know that feeling yet, so not a plot hole 
I agree that this book had a really strong start, but has kinda dragged for a bit. I can add childcare to the things I’m not interested in reading about in this series
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Not to scare you, but I felt volume 4 was fine, but volume 5 had a painfully slow part.
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Vol. 4, 神官長の招待状、神殿の家族会議、エピローグ
メモも取らず、しっかりと情報を覚えてまとめられるなんて、実は神官長はものうすごく記憶力が良いのではないだろうか。
No マイン、what you just explained really wasn’t that complicated in the first place.
Re: ルッツ’s parents and ベンノ meeting… That went a lot more peacefully than I thought it would. マイン getting some flack for “you should have just gotten everyone together to talk it out before getting the 神殿 involved” may be true, but I’m actually with マイン here on this one; I personally don’t believe ルッツ’s dad would have bothered explaining himself if someone ten steps up the social ladder hadn’t been present to force him to.
The resolution to this (especially in the epilogue) seemed to want to present ルッツ in a grown-up light, surprising his parents with how he’s changed and grown more responsible without their noticing, but all I could think about was how it felt more like a condemnation of them as parents to me; they basically have no idea at all what’s going on in ルッツ’s life at this point, it feels like. And sure, they have 4-5 sons, but ルッツ is all of six or seven (I really need to check their ages again); can you imagine having no idea what your 6/7-year-old was up to during the day? No idea that if he ran away from home, he already knows another sympathetic adult that would make sure he wasn’t sleeping on the streets?
Looking back at my previous chapter notes, I was hoping for a real heart-to-heart with his family, but I don’t feel fulfilled by what we got. Neither side really communicated clearly before this meeting, but when it came down to it the conversation just boiled down to, “I disapprove of this for reason x and y but I’m too much of an ass to say that before being forced to” “Okay, here are my counterpoints for both” “Welp, that clears all that up, you’re good to go”. The talk about what ルッツ did to earn his place as an apprentice and the bit at the end in the epilogue helped, but still…
And I definitely don’t often say this, but マイン at this point definitely feels the part of her isekai’d age. I don’t know whether to feel validated because she’s not a 26yo trapped in the body of a 6yo and too careless not to try to hide that, or frustrated that she still acts like a moron in situations like these. I guess its the close interpersonal relationships specifically that still really trip her up, which makes sense. I guess speaking of which, we know that 麗乃 had at least an okay relationship with her mother, but I don’t think we’ve heard anything about her father at this point, right?
…And that’s the end of the main book! There are two bonus short stories at the end; I’ll read and report on them for you @shitsurei so you’ll know whether there are any worth going back for.
End of Book Thoughts
I really enjoyed the first third of this book or so, looking back at my notes; the last 2/3 were okay, standard 本好き stuff (pretty much from that first cooking chapter it was back downhill, haha). So this was a pretty good ratio overall, I think, probably our best one yet. I was hoping we’d be a bit more involved with the 神殿 at this point, but the orphanage feels like a good start, so I’m hoping for more developments to occur soon, especially in regards to the 神殿長. As for the 神官長… I’m not sure what to think of the guy yet. His and マイン’s orbits still basically don’t overlap, for all him being her employer, and it’s hard to see right now on what basis their relationship might deepen. Something related to magic, perhaps, but it’s going to be a slow drip feed until we get there.
…Typing all this out, I have to admit I’ve been having fun with this book. It’s been quite rewarding talking it out and all with you and moaning about developments together shitsurei, and commenting chapter-by-chapter like this has definitely allowed me to sit down and chew on what we’ve been presented with. Regardless of the good or bad, 本好き’s author seems to put a good amount of effort into making each chapter deliberate and important in its own way, which is great for discussion, whether you care for soup-making or not. 
I’m interested to see where we’re going. Taking a quick glance at book subtitles without any spoilers ingested, it seems we have three more volumes in this arc, so plenty of room for development. Not sure if we can finish the arc this year, but it should be close, most likely.
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Oh I’m only 4 chapters away? Maybe I’ll get to reading today then
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Yep, you’re very close! This one’s a good chunk shorter than the last book, which helps.
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Realizing how close I was to the end got me through two whole chapters today 
Vol. 4, ルッツの行く道 & ルッツの家出
Getting sentenced to reflect on my behavior and then falling asleep instead is exactly the kind of thing I would have done in マイン’s position. Bonus points for getting a fever and being in bed for 3 days afterwards.
I feel like ルッツ could have a better situation if he got officially adopted, but there’s all the issues w/ コリンナ’s kid and such so I dunno, maybe it wouldn’t be better in the end. I don’t particularly see his current family situation of “eh, just let them figure it out” among all the brothers with him being the youngest working out for him, esp if he ends up having a lot more advantages than they do because of his apprenticeship and friendship/partnership with マイン.
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Here are quick summaries of the side stories @shitsurei; you’re far enough along in the book that there aren’t any spoilers here for you, so you can peruse at your leisure. tl;dr: Just the usual no-impact fluff. (And now I’m fully done with book 4! 
)
Vol. 4, 今はまだ遠い場所 & 側仕えの自覚
今はまだ遠い場所: We follow トゥーリ in this one; she tells two of her fellow seamstress apprentices about the things she’s learned from マイン and how that’s helped her get a bit more favored treatment at the factory (being able to greet guests, etc.), and the three decide to go do some people watching to learn about their fashion in the nicer areas of town on their next day off. The three set out and chat a little bit, but トゥーリ’s too nervous to go much further north before they meet ルッツ out on an errand, and he escorts them to ギルベルタ商会’s front doors. The two other girls pretty much at this point give up on the idea of learning about 金持ち fashion, since there aren’t any real opportunities to practice/use the knowledge, but トゥーリ doubles down on her determination to learn more, having been inspired by マイン.
側仕えの自覚: From ギル’s perspective. He and the orphans have their first day out in the forest with ルッツ、トゥール、and ギュンター. The orphans are all amazed at the outside world (and apparently don’t really understand what a 父 or 姉 is, though given their treatment doesn’t really surprise me) and ギル comes to fear that if he doesn’t step up and really put himself into his work and learn all he can that マイン might replace him with one of the other innumerable orphans or one of the 灰色の側仕え out-of-work peeps.
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Finished the main book as well! 
Vol. 4, 神官長の招待状、神殿の家族会議、エピローグ + book wrap up
Honestly, I’m a big “same” to a lot of your comments, lol. I enjoyed this volume more than the 3 prior, but it was still sloggy in the middle for me. I did notice finishing out the book that I hadn’t really stopped to look up words hardly at all in this one, and that I really only got lost in one conversation, so that was a cool thing to realize 
Not that I remember. She said something about her mom being a single mother that was friends with a woman in the building who also had a kid 麗乃’s age, but I think that’s all.
Insofar we’ve even heard about her mother it’s like, she insisted that they do a lot of diy stuff, but 麗乃 was still spending as much time as possible reading books anyway.
I definitely feel like she’s some sort of middle of her two ages, weighted heavily towards her current inhabited body’s age. Like I can imagine her being 12 or so, seeing my friends deal with their preteens, but not 6 and not 26
As much as ルッツ has had time to grow and mature, I continue to compare him to my 7 yo nephew, and he is waaaaaaay too mature to be 7. I would put his age at somewhere in the 14 yo range, realistically.
Same! I thought there would be more than just “oh well, everything was fine all along, we are just very Japanese set in our ways and don’t talk about things to each other.” Like I’m mostly happy with the wrap up, but it lacked any real character development that I was craving.
I did like the 3 second cameo from フリーダ at the end. I was thinking we were going to get through a whole book without her!
Yay now I don’t have to read them and I don’t feel like I missed anything. And with that, I’m marking the book done!
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End of book thoughts replies
That’s awesome! I’ve noticed that my own reading + listening for this series in particular has smoothed out considerably the forth book in.
Again, hard agree. Writing children in a meaningful way in fiction is hard, I figure. That, and I’m betting the author’s leaning on the idea of children needing to grow up faster when literally everyone has to work to support the family, e.g. children going into factories and stuff in the early industrial era.
That was a nice surprise! For as lukewarm as I generally was about her, it was surprisingly nice to see her.
So now that we’ve wrapped this up, I know we were talking freezer husband as a break book; any thoughts on when you’d like to start that?
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I’m, wildly, caught up on my clubs right now. I could start as soon as next week, but wouldn’t mind taking a week or so off between books. Also we might be able to grab more people if we wait a little bit before starting.
That said I did grab the book from Bookwalker today since they’re having some coinback thing rn.
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At least a week sounds good; i need to check my schedule to see whether Sep 1 or 8 (or thereabouts) works best for my schedule.
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