Sorry, you can buy audiobooks in a lot of places but I don’t know where to find free audiobooks legally.
I’ve seen some people mention there are audiobooks on youtube but I don’t have any experience with that. you could get better answers in a bigger jp learning community probably. Natively forums aren’t that big, and most people probably don’t even check this thread
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Open Library has free stuff incl. audiobooks, but I don’t know how much of the latter is in Japanese.
People usually get their audiobooks with VPN and a yomihoudai offer, as e.g. from Kindle unlimited or bookwalker.
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Gotcha, I just listen to normal music for that… It’s possibly a bit distracting, but I have stuff I’ve listened to enough that I can tune it out
I also found it a bit harder than expected when I tried
Interesting. For me it’s definitely the opposite - tho to be fair, I did find the 美文 style in マリみて pretty difficult at first, and book 1.
That’s exactly what I don’t like about it 
or at least there’s something about his particular way of doing that that makes it hard for me to find my bearings; and it is the author’s style in general. NHKにようこそ! | L32 is the only other book like that I can think of, and I wouldn’t have minded it there, except for that I found the protagonist’s mental state rather agitating, and it was a lot of 妄想 and daydreaming that blurred with reality, to the point that it was hard to know which was which. Actually I found that easier than what I read of Adashima as well, I think.
Actually I guess 灰と幻想のグリムガル | L31 has a lot of that too - and I would not have minded it there, except that it often carried on far too long (it also took until the end of volume 5 for the author to learn the power of summary 
)
I mostly agree, and don’t particularly recommend the book. I tried it during an “I wanna try stuff outside of my comfort zone” phase, and decided not to read vol 2. Tangentially, someone dropped a rather displeased review (SPOILERS) of 私の初恋相手がキスしてた | L32 (same author, same Adashima universe) in a discord I’m in - and the stody largely involves a very f’d up adult x minor relationship, and lots of other really intense stuff. Considering he also wrote the Saeki Sayaka novels, the author’s got quite the range.
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Even after 2 books, to me it is still harder than adashima. But descriptive writing is something I sometimes even struggle with in languages I’m far more fluent in.
Although that review is very negative, it actually piqued my interest. I enjoy really messy, dramatic, intense stories where no one gets what they want. I think that’s the sort of age gap I could enjoy 
I’m also curious that the main character apparently shows up in adashima at some point (and vice versa?). Though, I don’t think I will pick it up until my reading speed improves. I don’t like that sort of thing quite that much that I want to spend 3 months on it.
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That’s fair… I think book 3 or so is where it started to click for me. Also like I’ve read 34 of them at this point, and 1.25 of the Adashima author’s (and only slightly tried 佐伯さやか and あだしま)… so there’s a huge bias here I imagine if I got a bit further in, the disparity might feel less. I did find the teacher book easier than the 初恋相手 book tho for w/e reason
Same actually - that’s why I mentioned.
Tbh it’s a bit hard to imagine in either direction. She’s also a prominent side character in the teacher book.
I also would not wanna spend 3 months on that lol
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Thanks ! I see there are audible books on Amazon.jp but fairly pricey without subscription. I might try one in the future.
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Thanks. Will have a look at Open Library, haven’t heard of it before.
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I have found some audio books on YouTube for Japanese so I guess there should be some in other languages too. Apparently Audible (even the free version), Apple books, Spotify premium and some other audio sites have free audiobooks though their options and languages might be restricted based on the country you sign in from. That being said, I have found Japanese books/ audio books on Apple books for free just to download and keep.
If you are looking for Japanese specifically, Oto Navi app does have audio only for graded readers for free (namely the Genki reader sets). not sure if that would be of any interest. And some of the books I have got you the free audio book from audiobooks.JP if you scan it into the app (can’t remember which ones specifically but I do have a mix of textbooks and novels I picked up for free that way).
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Early weekly update because I will be on the road tomorrow.
- Finished level 40 of wk deck at last. There were a few words that were really similiar that slowed me down.
- Finished Chainsawman rewatch. I think I like it more on rewatch it’s such a good adaptation. Also watched a few eps of Doremi.
- Manga: 5 volumes. Done with ハッピーシュガーライフ, though there is an extra short volume. I skimmed through it and wasn’t terribly interested but I’ll probably read it at some point. Started 少女漫画主人公×ライバルさん which is…ok. It’s a quick read and right now I still feel a bit on the verge of burnout so it’s nice to breeze through something.
- Read more adashima. I try to listen to the audiobook afterwards but the only time I have for it is before sleeping and it just … puts me to sleep. Read a bit of 5分後に意外な結末 in an attempt to have something more simple to switch to but the first 2 stories were remarkably pointless. So I’m not sure I will continue that.
jp
wk deck:40/45
manga: 56+5/75
books:9/6
vns: 1.5/1
de
books 3/12 (dropped the book I was reading… 
)
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- For personal reasons, I will not be adding any new cards the next 1-2 months, so I will remain in level 40 for a while. Since my yearly goal was 45, that’s not a big problem. (similarly I think I will pause my chinese study as well - even thoguh it’s just 5-10 mins a day, right now I don’t want to increase my mental load)
- Mostly focused on manga this week. Read 14 vols, though about half of these are from LIBERTA | L18 which has 50-60 page volumes. It would probably be more like 10 regular sized volumes but if I start taking page sizes into consideration things might get too complicated.
- Didn’t read much of adashima, so I want to focus on it next week since the month is almost over.
jp
wk deck:40/45
manga: 61+14/75 andd just writing this I realized that’s the perfect amount to reach my goal, couldn’t have done this on purpose if I tried.
books:9/6
vns: 1.5/1
de
books 3+1/12
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I flipped through it a bit ok Bookwalker. Looks maybe interesting, but maybe weird. Anything particular you liked/disliked about it?
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I wouldn’t particularly recommend it… It’s an edgy and horny power fantasy, which isn’t inherently bad , btu there isn’t much more to it. The notable thing about it is simply that it stands out among yuri titles. If it was longer id probably not have finished it but at it lenght it was ok for what it was. Also one of the volumes is basically just porn. Which I didn’t expect, the story until then was certainly horny the sex all was offscreen lol. But that volume does have the most suggestive cover, so maybe I should have been clued in.
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ありがとうございます🦆
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Nothing much this week, finished adashima (I think in the end it’s not significantly easier than marimite, I rated them as same), kept up with my reviews with no new cards, and read 3 volumes of manga.
I had some stuff going on this week, and July is going to be busy as well so updates will be sparse until everything is settled.
monthly goals update
- finish ハッピーシュガーライフ → still reading this but I’m changing the goal to finish or catch up with a manga.
- finish chainsawman rewatch in jp
- Finish a book! probably adashima.
- Finish the hsk level 1 section on superchinese. I don’t plan on making many mandarin goals, but this one I almost accomplished anyway, and I think once I’ve done that I can make a proper check in on where I really am with it (not far! but it might be nice to look back on eventually).
My intention here was simply to finish all the lessons in the section, I wasn’t aware of the test at the end. I paused my chinese studies as stated before and never passed the test. I feel like I did do what I set out to, but I’d feel better about it if I had passed the test. - Finish another german book.
new goals: keeping it simple because of aforementioned reasons
- finish a manga series
- finish an anime (or equivalent amount of time)
- finish a german book
- DON’T study any new cards for the WK deck
jp
wk deck:40/45
manga: 75+3/75
books:9+1/6
vns: 1.5/1
de
books 4/12
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Honestly wasn’t even sure if I should post anything here, but it’s been a habbit for more than a year so might as well.
Kept up with reviews and finished 2 vols of manga ( パパのセクシードール). By the way if anyone is ever curious about what I think about stuff I read I write detailed thoughts on my anilist and bluesky. Next I want to start the yuri club read 付き合ってあげてもいいかな. I should be able to do that much a week at least.
I didn’t do much else, besides reviews. I also watched one episode of watanare because someone happened to link it, though not with full attention. Harems, regardless of the nature of the relationships do not appeal to me, and I doubt this will be any different, but the animation and directing was pretty good , especially the first scene with the pov bento shots. I guess I’ll keep watching for now. They talk pretty quickly, but it felt understandable. I did switch to english some times because there were words I missed and jp subtitle was ai generated.
jp
wk deck:40/45
manga: 78+2/75
books:10/6
vns: 1.5/1
de
books 4/12
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Just keeping up with reviews and 付き合ってあげてもいいかな this week. Probably won’t post next week at all, as that’s the week we finally move. Hopefully I will return to regular studies in August though. Lately I really want to read vns again. I nominated some stuff in the vn club. Hopefully something I already own will be voted because I really can’t spend more money on games right now 
Anyway, for my monthly goals all I have left is finishing an anime, and I did in fact start 彼方のアストラ though didn’t even watch a full episode yet.
For german I did finish a (short) audiobook.
I set some new goals in the yearly goals channel but I might change them when I can plan more clearly. But here are the stats with my new goals (which I basically already reached, really shows how much I was thinking while setting them )
jp
wk deck:40/45
manga: 80/100
books:10/12
vns: 1/2 (I removed the .5 of nekopara, to simplify counting)
de
books 4+1/12
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Well it’s been 2 weeks. I wish I could say things are back to usual, but not yet. Maybe next week. Next week, I want to catch up with the yuri book club pick at least.
- Kept up with wk reviews. Barely. I pretedicted the two days I would be most busy and reviewed ahead the day before. But I didn’t predict how busy I would be even afterwards. I did get them done one way or the other but I have much more leeches than usual which is frustrating. I ignored my mined deck completely, and not certain what I will do about the piled up reviews. Kind of tempted to just delete it.
- I did finish my last monthly goal of finishing 1 anime, which means they’re all completed.
jp: (unchanged)
wk deck: 40/45
manga: 80/100
books: 10/12
vns: 1/2
de:
During the move I found a tiny book of lawyer jokes that I read which took me maybe an hour but by my own rules it counts for 2. I mean, it sounds like im cheating the system but I’m currently reading a 700 page book in audio format so it probably evens out.
books: 5+2 /12
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I need to do that too
You could always export the words, delete, and re-add - basically resetting it. I did that with my proper nouns & names deck, when it got too overwhelming (which reminds me, I’ve been neglecting it…). (Most of the time I’d just delete though)
This made me realize: I wish there was other SRS software with a typing mechanism, like WK. I feel like that was really beneficial for memory, and could probably use it for some of the rarer kanji. I guess I could replicate it by handwriting the leeches/mix-ups 
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I’m not sure specifically how to set this up, but you can actually do this in anki. The wk deck I use (I dislike some choices the official site made so I use the deck) works this way.
Though tbh, I generally don’t type at this point in favor of speed. I think I’d rather half-learn 10 cards than master 5 in the same amount of time. This might change in the future though, esp if I want to tackle leeches.
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