🍭 ふしぎ駄菓子屋 銭天堂 👵 이상한 과자 가게 전천당 🍬 Offshoot Book Club

All Languages
, , ,
1

This is the informal offshoot book club for the ふしぎ駄菓子屋 銭天堂 series. The first volume was read as a Children’s Book Club pick, and for those who want to continue reading and discussing the series, you can do so here. As it’s an informal club, we don’t have a reading schedule, so you can read at your own pace. :smiling_face:

Book Club Links
Book Club 🥳 Children's Book Club 📚 NOW VOTING! ⚠
Home Thread 🍭 ふしぎ駄菓子屋 銭天堂 👵 이상한 과자 가게 전천당 🍬 Home Thread
Japanese Series ふしぎ駄菓子屋銭天堂 | L23
Korean Series 이상한 과자 가게 전천당 | L24

Discussion Guidelines

  • Spoilers should always be hidden using spoiler blur.
  • When discussing a specific section, please mention where you are in the book so people reading different versions have a clear point of reference.
  • Feel free to read ahead if it’s exciting, but please refrain from spoiling ahead of the appropriate week.
  • If you have a question about grammar, vocab, cultural things, etc - ask! That’s a welcome part of the discussion too, and other readers will be happy to help.

Polls :bar_chart:

Will you be reading along with us?
  • Yes! :heart_eyes:
  • Maybe… :thinking:
  • No :cry:
0 voters
I have finished…
  • volume 1
  • volume 2
  • volume 3
  • volume 4
  • volume 5
  • volume 6
  • volume 7
  • volume 8
  • volume 9
  • volume 10
0 voters
I have finished…
  • volume 11
  • volume 12
  • volume 13
  • volume 14
  • volume 15
  • volume 16
  • volume 17
  • volume 18
  • volume 19
  • volume 20
0 voters
I have finished…
  • 1 The official guidebook
  • 2 The 天獄園 spin-off
  • 3 The 招き猫 book
0 voters
3 Likes
2

image
image920×720 266 KB

I am having double-vision. :eyes: Is that a me issue?

1 Like
3

How odd! The page is displaying normally for me - you might have caught it mid-sync? I noticed the more recent volumes were missing, so I queued it for sync a little while ago. :thinking:

2 Likes
4

Thanks for starting this thread!

So… I absolutely love these books and started Book 2 right away. Here are my thoughts so far. I’ll put general comments in drop downs and do extra blurring of spoilers - so you can open these even if you haven’t read yet or are part way through.

Book 2

Prologue

hhmmm I’m liking how the world is widening and I’m really curious if we’re going to hear any stories about how these capsules work out. But I’m a little confused - the idea of people coming in the shop is that Beniko selects something for them specifically, if they get a capsule from a machine, is there some mechanism that what they get fulfills their desire? I guess I’ll have to wait and see

Ch 1

oooh, so a really unconventional one. On the character: So far there has been an implicit moral high ground, and yet here we see her helping a thief to do it better! or is that a tricky way of making sure the (ending spoiler) police officer / detective gets his big break? This makes me very curious about who is setting the rules here of what is a good fortune?

Ch 2

OMG maybe my favourite one so far!!! I absolutely loved this :star_struck: ち先生 is just so cute and I love how she (progression part) just innocently tries so hard to help everyone.

Well, I’ll probably slow down a bit. Ch 3 has a lot of unknown vocab (the first 2 pages feel like the one from Book 1 with the beautician dude, so instead of binging in bed on the weekends when I wake up, I’ll have to do some lookups when I have time to get further. And since I’m taking a bit of a mini-holiday next week it might be a few weeks until I get back to this.

Have fun everyone!

3 Likes
5

I have way too many other books that I should be reading instead, but I caved and started volume 2. So far, again, this is super fun! The descriptions of the shop stay both similar enough that I already know a bunch of the descriptive vocab, but I’m still learning a lot of new words as well.

I’m halfway through chapter 1, and I find it pretty funny that while the main character for this one is a thief, he didn’t end up actually stealing anything from the store and it’s a non thief character from book one that stole something. I found the confession of the thief that he wanted to be very interesting, we’ve already seen that the characters visiting the store don’t really think clearly, but here, it really does seem like he was compulsed to say what he wished for!

2 Likes
6

So glad you started!!

I find this so helpful, too. Some stories I can read straight through, and others, there are just predictable points where I might need lookups: first two pages (scene/topic setting for the new character’s desire), Beniko’s comments when she sells the sweet, which sometimes have a hint of how it will go wrong, and then the instructions/warning text on the sweet. It makes it a lot easier to settle into reading it.

Ch 1 reply

This one is so fun, the character is just so unconventional and unlike all the others that came before. I hadn’t thought about what you said, this contrast that he’s a thief, but he doesn’t steal anything from Beniko, interesting.

yeah, that pattern has repeated enough I’m wondering as well, if there’s something about Beniko and the shop that gets them to express their wish so directly, and then they always have this super strong desire for whatever she pulls out.

I really really like how each chapter brings in new ways of playing with this world.

I’ll put in some more comments from the next ones before I forget. I’ll organise it with spoilers so that if you’re partway through it’s clear what you can uncover at what stage. I’ll edit my previous one’s like that, too.

Vol 2 Ch 3

I read this one a couple of times, first in a rush because it got me hooked, then with a lot of lookups because there was a lot of unknown vocab and I wasn’t totally confident about the story progression.

Character thoughts: some good old-fashioned teenage-ish girl trying to fit in at school. I liked how she was purposefully trying not to go into 銭天堂 but the allure caught her anyway!

The snack: this reminds me of cereals that came with little toys, and I love the idea of this ritual she does with the keyholder to ask it questions

One common theme in the development stage seems to be people suddenly get a power and then misuse it or become afraid that someone else will also gain it. Human nature I suppose, sigh

Ending - total shocker! First of all, the 銭転堂, and I was not expecting something so dramatic at the end and had to reread it with a lot of lookups to make sure I got that right. oooooh the wrath of the fox spirit got her sucked in and I’m so curious where Beniko’s comments go in terms of that case potentially being useful for a future customer, if I got that right. From the guide book I know this comes up again in Book 8.

Vol 2 Ch 4

I love the character here and right from the start seeing Beniko outside of the shop again. The snack: What a cool idea to be able to play the piano like a genious after having a snack. This one feels quite believable in how the MC (progression part) gets wrapped up in the new ability and suddenly starts on a new life trajectory. Toward the end/climax: The concert is devestating :sob: and then when Beniko showed up I was like, wait that is cheating :joy: so I’m wondering, it seems as if she has some rules she has to work within as well, and if therefore she sneakily purposefully sold the snack past its due date so she had an excuse to step in to avoid a 不幸 situation and turn it around! Resolution: I liked the character development where the MC thinks ahead and realises the Schumann snack doesn’t give him long term happiness :heartbeat: There must be so many play on words with the snacks we just miss, but here I like the 消しゴム 消しガム link.

2 Likes
7

@soggyboy will you be joining us here??!

:grin:

2 Likes
8

Yes!! I already bought volumes 2 and 3 so I will read that many at least and then decide on continuing. I already had bought some volumes of Goosebumps as well, so I want to make some progress on the volume I had already started before I return to this series. Hoping I’ll see some gains in terms of reading speed soon so I can progress faster on these reads.

1 Like
9

no pressure, keep it fun :smiling_face: