Welcome to the first book of the Absolute Beginner Book Club!
This book club originated in the Korean forum, but since we will be reading Yotsuba&! I thought Japanese learners (or learners of any other language for that matter) might be interested in joining
All discussions about the book will take place in this thread, I donāt anticipate us being so many readers that we would need weekly threads to keep things organised.
We do have a schedule that you are free to follow, or ignore if you get overcome by the adventures of Yotsuba and want to read ahead! (All while minding spoilers of course.)
Some general guidelines
Since everything will be posted in this one thread, please make sure you mention where you are in the book, and blur any and all spoiler.
This thread is intended to be a place to share opinions and excitement from the book, but also to ask questions about vocab, grammar, cultural aspects, etc, so feel free to ask for help! This is an Absolute Beginner Book Club, so more than ever, no dumb questions
updated reading schedule
Here is the new schedule, updated to accelerate the reading:
Week
Chapter
Pages
Start Date
End date
1
1
4-27
21/10
27/10
2
1
28-51
28/10
3/11
3
2 & 3
52-117
4/11
10/11
4
4 & 5
118-172
11/11
17/11
5
6 & 7
173-159
18/11
24/11
vocab list
I set up this ģģø ė°ė! Vol. 1 Vocab Sheet for the Korean version. It is open to edits, feel free to add any and all vocab you feel helpful!
If you are reading in another language and happen to have a vocab sheet, it would be great to share as well
I havenāt, I wasnāt able to find it on Amazon ES (not very good at navigating amazon thoughā¦)
That also crossed my mind when I saw the difference, and I hope it doesnāt end up being on par with the German version, or Iām going to be way out of my depth
Iād definitely be interested in reading the Spanish version, but itās a big shame that thereās no digital (along with every other translation for it). ;( Might casually read along in Japanese, might see if I can find the Spanishā¦ We shall see.
Oh noā¦ I could definitely read it with this group to grade itā¦
(Iām not allowed to continue with other languages until I burn out on Japanese or can read level 30 books without looking up every word on the page butā¦Iām not even sure that German is going to be the language I go back to next butā¦)
kicking things off, though I havenāt finished the assigned reading yet:
itās my first time reading a manga in korean (and i donāt have much experience reading any other type of book 100% in korean either), but so far it hasnāt been as tedious as i was expecting!! a slow process for sure, but still very enjoyable and rewarding.
as for the story, i left off when Yotsuba apparently runs off somewhere, and the neighbour makes an appearance, iām excited to meet more characters
speaking of characters, it took me an embarassing amout of time to realize that ģ ė³“ was a name, and not a word that for some reason didnāt exist in any dictionnary i could find
Oh, funnily enough thatās where I left off with the Spanish yesterday. This is probably going to end up being a weird manga for me Spanish-wise; Iām technically capable of reading stuff at this level easily, but Yotsuba has used nothing but slang and colloquialisms so far, and I know basically none of those.
Interesting observation: The Spanish title is just Ā”Yotsuba! with no indication of the āandā in the title in Japanese. The English version went with Yotsuba&!, which doesnāt flow super well when saying it aloud, but does get that conjunction in there.
This is why I love particles, it allows for so many interesting constructions. Ā”Yotsuba y! just doesnāt sound as good as ģģø ė°ė, and Iām guessing ćć¤ć°ćØ. I do like Yotsuba& though, it gets the point across.
I heard that from Japanese learners as well, but I havenāt found it to be the case in Korean at allā¦ Maybe itās because Iām just not at a level yet where I can identify slang, most things are new so I have to look them up anyway, slang or not. But itās interesting to get spoken language, instead of the regular ābook-spanish/koreanā level of language. And hey, that way you get the beginner experience all over again, this time with colloquialisms!
iirc, in Japanese she talks a lot like her dad, so not exactly slang, per se, but not the way someone would expect a child (and especially a girl) to talk.
I just finished this week! Iām going for the Korean version, letās just say I need to review my Japanese before Iāll be able to decipher the original version. So far, this is a very nice and cute story, I can see why itās so popular!
The grammar though I was surprised at, because thereās a bunch of grammar points that are definitely more intermediate than beginner (ć“ė°, źµ¬ė, ė¤ėė¼ā¦). But I guess as the sentences are short, itās still beginner friendly .
Iām curious though, for those that have read/are reading the Japanese version, whatās the grammar like?
My memory is pretty fuzzy on the Japanese, so I canāt comment on that specifically, but Yotsubaās such an interesting case for language learners. Itās basically universally hailed as ideal for beginners, but itās got a lot of quirks that really work against it. I think even @brandon mentioned one of the reasons he started natively was because he figured there had to be something better for beginners than Yotsuba.
I just checked a few pages from the online preview. She uses āmaleā slang, like ććć, ćććć¼, ććć¼. Her father and fatherās friend do as well (although they are making natural sentences for adults).
That sounds like a hard time for someone who only practiced textbook Japanese, but for someone whoās been talking/hanging out with Japanese guys in a completely relaxed setting, that might be a much easier match, as itās just the same thing written down.
So, I guess it can work for some beginners, depending on their background.
Indeed this is accurate, very good memory haha. I am happy that there are many things still rated easier than Yotsuba even if itās still rated too low imo. I feel like it should be lvl 19/20 .
Granted I always weighted grammar/slang much more heavily than vocab I think.
Edit:
Now Iām curious to readā¦ perhaps iāll join. Thatās certainly intermediate grammar, but I think thatās pretty similiar to the Japanese version. Frankly, thatās textbook grammar so Iām curious if it has a lot of the slangy stuff which @Naphthalene alludes to in the Japanese version, thatās what made it hard for me originally.
FWIW while itās recommended as a āBeginnerā manga, that usually means people starting native material, not beginners in general. Most people recommend for upper N4 learnersā¦ equivalent to Topik 3.
idk. That distinction is not usually made, or at least as far as Iāve seen, so even if the person is thinking ābeginner native materialā in their heads, them typing ābeginner materialā just gets read as āI started learning Japanese one month agoā.
I donāt know how many times Iāve read this first volume (English, Japanese, and now in Korean), but itās always gold!
Week 1
Iāve learned a new word, ź½! Look at ģė¹ ās expressionā¦
I always assumed the shortened day names were used only in writing to save space, but I wonder if they can be spoken like that too, or if it would sound a bit unnatural?
Also enjoying the appearance of the rare middle dot for listing.
Week 2 (accidentally read a little ahead )
So ė§¤ėÆø make a āė§“ā noiseā¦ Itās like a pokemon call!
updated reading schedule 
vocab list 
.
