理由 Informal Reading Club

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理由 | L34 is a mystery story by 宮部みゆき which won the Naoki Prize in 1991. It’s quite a long one at 686 pages in my 新潮文庫 edition, and it seems to only be available in paperback or audiobook form. The back cover blurb says it uses ドキュメンタリー的な手法 as its narrative style.

This is going to be an informal readthrough in the style of the one we did last year for レベル7; we’ll do all the discussion in this single thread.

Start date and schedule up for discussion but I’m thinking about the same 30-40 page a week pace as we did on レベル7. (I’ll write up the chapter lengths in a bit - it has 21 chapters of varying lengths without internally numbered subsections.)

Tagging @cat and @Belerith but of course anybody is welcome to join in.

We will start on Saturday 9th November.

Schedule:

Week Date Chapters Pages
Week 1 Nov 9 Prologue + Chapter 1 52 pages
Week 2 Nov 16 Chapter 2 45 pages
Week 3 Nov 23 Chapter 3 + 4 50 pages
Week 4 Nov 30 Chapter 5 39 pages
Week 5 Dec 7 Chapter 6 60 pages
Week 6 Dec 14 Chapter 7 40 pages
Week 7 Dec 21 Chapter 8 + 9 45 pages
Week 8 Dec 28 Chapter 10+11 38 pages
Week 9 Jan 4 Chapter 12 30 pages
Week 10 Jan 11 Chapter 13 31 pages
Week 11 Jan 18 Chapter 14 41 pages
Week 12 Jan 25 Chapter 15 33 pages
Week 13 Feb 1 Chapter 16 + 17 51 pages
Week 14 Feb 8 Chapter 18 34 pages
Week 15 Feb 15 Chapter 19 28 pages
Week 16 Feb 22 Chapter 20 + 21 54 pages
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I’m interested!
The book has been on my wish list for a while, so I’ll join if my schedule allows it.

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Here are the chapter lengths:

Chapter Pages
Prologue 7 pages
Chapter 1 45 pages
Chapter 2 34 pages
Chapter 3 14 pages
Chapter 4 36 pages
Chapter 5 39 pages
Chapter 6 60 pages
Chapter 7 40 pages
Chapter 8 14 pages
Chapter 9 31 pages
Chapter 10 19 pages
Chapter 11 19 pages
Chapter 12 30 pages
Chapter 13 31 pages
Chapter 14 41 pages
Chapter 15 33 pages
Chapter 16 23 pages
Chapter 17 28 pages
Chapter 18 34 pages
Chapter 19 28 pages
Chapter 20 30 pages
Chapter 21 24 pages

Those first few chapters are kind of awkward for length – we could do week 1 as prologue + chapter one = 52 pages, week 2 chapters 2 and 3 = 48 pages, but that gives two heavy weeks right up front. Or we could do prologue + 1, 2, 3+4 for 52,34,50 pages I guess. The laid-back option would be to do four weeks for prologue, ch1, ch2, ch3. There are no within-chapter section breaks so if we want to split a chapter it would just be picking an arbitrary paragraph end at some point.

Other than that, merging chapters 8+9 in one week and 10+11 in one week would deal with the other super short chapters without too much awkwardness.

What do people think?

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I’m fine with whatever we decide, though I’d prefer to keep chapters intact. I’m in favor of merging the prologue with chapter 1 and the other weeks you mentioned.

If we’re all okay with 50 page weeks, we could merge even more, but I’m also fine with taking a bit longer to read. I just need to be done with the book before March since I’ll be leaving my physical books behind for half a year then, but if need be I can finish a tad early. :slight_smile:

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I’m also ok with 50 pages a week. I went ahead and ordered a physical copy as doing bookclubs where I’m only listening is always a bit strange (don’t know how to write character names, harder to refer back to things) but even if we start before it arrives I’m sure a chapter or two audio only won’t be too bad.

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I’m also waiting for my copy to arrive. It should get here sometime during next week at the latest, but if you guys want to start right away that’s fine with me as well.

50 pages/week seems doable to me. Though I would prefer it if we don’t consistently go over 60 pages at the start (every once in a while is fine). Do we want to ramp up the speed towards the end or not?

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I don’t think I can join until next year (so in ~2 months), but I guess the club will still be going on then, so I may join as well.
I know nothing about it and haven’t read the blurb. I just recognize the author’s name and the people in this thread :upside_down_face:

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OK, so how about:

Week 1 prologue + chapter 1 : 52 pages
Week 2 chapter 2 : 45 pages
Week 3 chapter 3 + 4 : 50 pages
Week 4 chapter 5 : 39 pages
Week 5 chapter 6: 60 pages
Week 6 chapter 7 : 40 pages
Week 7 chapter 8 + 9 : 45 pages
Week 8 chapter 10+11 : 38 pages
Week 9 chapter 12 : 30 pages
Week 10 chapter 13 : 31 pages
Week 11 chapter 14 : 41 pages
Week 12 Chapter 15 : 33 pages
Week 13 Chapter 16 + 17 : 51 pages
Week 14 Chapter 18 : 34 pages
Week 15 Chapter 19 : 28 pages
Week 16 Chapter 20 + 21 : 54 pages

At 16 weeks, if we start on Saturday 9 November to give time for books to arrive, week 16 begins on 22 Feb, so we will be done before @belerith’s March deadline.

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Sounds good to me!

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I might see if I can join in as well. :open_mouth: Would still need to order a copy, and I’ve been really flaky with books lately, but I’d like to give it a shot at least for a little while.

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OK, I’ve updated the top post with that schedule with the dates added.

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I will join if I can find a copy at a bookoff here. That author usually has quite a big section, so I am optimistic. Should have seen this before, than I could have checked earlier. I got a different series by that author incidentally(悲嘆の門 | L30??). She likes to write long stories. :sweat_smile:

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You should check out 模倣犯 if you haven’t already! 5 volumes all at least over 400 pages, some over 500. :rofl:

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Got my chunky boi in the mail today:


It’s a cool 630 pages.

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I must have the big font size this time cause mine is 790 :rofl: It t h i c c

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I’ve got so many columns on one page, haha. I hope my eyes survive this.

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I started a smidge early due to having a bit of a weird schedule coming up and wanting to be sure I had time. I’m taking notes of names as I go. I imagine not everyone will come up again, but given how many keep coming up I’m glad I’m not doing this by pure audiobook, my aural memory for names (even in English) is so bad :sweat_smile:

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Not in the bargain section but at 250 yen still a bargain. :partying_face:

686 pages. :melting_face:

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