Good luck to us!! Did you talk to other test takers? I was surprised that even at N2 Level there are still so many people that do not read (voluntarily). Of course I had to plug Natively, and got some looks when I said I read not one, but gasp multiple novels this year. Seems like I’m just deep in the “just read bro" bubble.
I thought about doing an N1 mock test soon, just because I’m curious how much I’ll actually improve (in test taking?)
I’m taking an in person advanced Japanese class and we’re all roughly N2 (at least 3 out of the 6 of us I know took the test), and they’re always so impressed that I’m reading books in Japanese. I’m like, the first will be a struggle, but you all can do this. It’s crazy how much reading is just not done by most learners. (I have no idea how anyone can pass the JLPT without reading!!)
This made me giggle, I have that feeling too when people are surprised I read books, and I tell them something along the lines of “you too can be a reader with these 5 hacks, the last one will surprise you!”. We really are YouTube clickbait but for books.
I think they’re mostly just reading study books, or sometimes news articles.
I mean I get that you might think reading fantasy or romance won’t help you much with JLPT, but it actually does help so much in terms of upping reading speed so you have time to actually think about the text and questions.
Likely partnered with the fact that some people don’t even read in their native language (which is also baffling to me - and probably to lots of other people here, the bubble is cozy, isn’t it)
GUYS THERE WILL BE A AKATSUKI NO YONA 2ND SEASON
My timelines are going craaaazy atm omg I didn’t think I’d live to this day this is a fever dream
Guess now’s the best time to start reading the manga again in Japanese 
I saw that the manga is ending this month so I’m about to go buy the rest of the manga and make that my main manga reading project in 2026!!
I’m at vol. 23/47(?) on my Japanese reread, but I stopped somewhere in the 30s when I was reading the English version. This was 5 years ago, but I could tell it was heading towards the end back then, so it’s exciting to actually know it’s finally happening!
I’m also excited to re-experience some of the earlier volumes through the anime ~ I really liked the soundtrack in season 1.
Woo-hoo! I actually haven’t read the series myself, but I know how long fans have been waiting. That’s awesome to hear!
I was too lazy to crop them the same size so please look away if you have OCD 
Top two rows are mangas (not all but most volumes from a series), bottom two are novels/light novels.
Happy to announce that I passed N2!
Vocab and grammar is as expected, ramping that up to finish my N1 vocab lists will be tough work though. The quantity is not the issue, but specifically for the JLPT I need to focus on context work.
Reading is a bit disappointing, last time N3 I got a manten, 42 is not too far off from what I scored in prep exams but I had more hope, especially considering that I had no time issues. I guess maybe I’m just bad at answering questions, regardless of Japanese. Areas for improvement could be reading more non-fiction material and think pieces. I’m following the MOOK thread with great interest, already bought one of the magazines but sadly the digital version is not as skimmable as the physical version.
That being said, I wish I had bought more books when I was in Japan last year, but it was so difficult navigating the shelfs when deciphering the shelf names was already challenging.
I’m glad with my overall score in total, though it’s probably not enough for the N1 in December. I would need more than 141 to get the C1 level, which I would be aiming for. I don’t want a B2 pass… Ahhh どうしよう。。。
Congratulations!
Congrats!! That’s a really solid score all around. You’re definitely on your way to N1 already. 
Congratulations on passing N2 with such a good score! 
I can totally relate! Had the same issue when I was in Japan last year. I had a long list but because I had to ask a 店員さん I ended up only asking for one series out of my list 
Grammar
Recently, I have been trying to be a little more consistent with my grammar study.
After thinking about it a bit and considering the recent JLPT results, it’s probably my vague understanding of some grammar points that’s holding me back. I think reading a lot helps, but I still catch myself glossing over some sentences when I think that I got the general gist–but then realize I didn’t.
So now I’m mainly using these grammar resources:
Reading
Currently I’m reading 娘の結婚 | L26?? which is basically about the relationship between father-daughter (or in a more wider sense parents-children). Not sure why I had this in my library, it’s not my typical read 
Anyway, I again noticed that sometimes I have a hard time following the plot when people act completely different to what I would expect. For example, in this novel the (adult) daughter is getting married and is planning to introduce her fiance to her father. The novel is written from her father’s and her POV.
They make a HUGE deal out of this, and spend a LOT of time thinking this out. So yeah, I get there’s a cultural difference but still this is so hard for me to grasp, when my own experience with my in-laws was and still is, super casual and friendly. Or, it comes up in the novel, that the future mom-in-law is somehow not liked by other people because of her personality. They make a huge deal out of it, when (in my opinion) it isn’t even her fault (she strikes me as neuro-divergent) but it’s portrayed as if she’s evil and grounds for never dealing with that family or any of its decendants again. I sat there reading like full chapters about the quote unquote problematic mom and being like “ok so now why does that even matter”
I also have those two books! I’m going through SKM in my tutoring sessions and, well to be honest so far haven’t done anything more than flip through Try although I’m not planning on taking the N1 until 2027 at the earliest (I didn’t squeak my N2 pass, but I still had a rather low score). I think it’ll be this summer by the time we finish up the grammar points in SKM and then I might pick up the Sou Matome books next. I really like the format of them (it’s by the same group as Try, which is why I grabbed that one), but they did feel quite a bit easier than the actual test, so I’m planning to use them later this year to practice the N1.5 level 
I also like to check Bunpro..I absolutely hate their SRS grammar system (and decided less than halfway through the trial it wasn’t for me), but all of their explanations are available with a free account (no subscription needed), and I do like that you can easily toggle between your chosen display language and Japanese. I’ve been adding those (or ones from YouTube teachers) to my Anki cards when the SKM explanations are too vague for me.
N2 pass gang
Righttt, forgot about bunpro, I used it a bit in combination with looking up the Tobira grammar points. I’m in the same camp, I don’t have a subscription, I only use the lookup.
Speaking of, I got the last one of the Dictionary of Japanese grammar books, so now I feel fully equipped 
I’m currently doing a read through starting with the first one (currently at letter K).
Reached 15k words in Renshuu, yay
Renshuu
| New terms | 2024 | 2025 | 2026 | Jan | Feb | Mar |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vocabulary | 5,349 | 3,523 | 1476 | 346 | 364 | 766 |
| Kanji | 429 | 341 | 92 | 18 | 33 | 41 |
| Grammar | 102 | 138 | 51 | 15 | 22 | 14 |
| Natively | 2024 | 2025 | 2026 | Jan | Feb | Mar |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Days Read | 222 | 228 | 67 | 19 | 22 | 26 |
| (M)angas/(N)ovels finished | 69M/4N | 43M/11N | 6M/5N | 2N | 3M/2N | 3M/1N |
| Pages read Manga | 12,675 | 8,150 | 930 | 61 | 488 | 381 |
| Pages read Novels | 1,491 | 3,059 | 1,384 | 433 | 483 | 468 |
| (E)pisodes/(M)ovies watched | 295E/5M | 248E/5M | 65E/2M | 47E/1M | 3E/1M | 15E |
| Hours watched | 103 | 110 | 36.6 | 24 | 2.8 | 9.6 |
A manga about an age-gap friendship, connected by the love for BL 
It had a very 癒し系 feel, and I really liked the themes in this book about growing and ageing. I wonder if the mangaka has drawn actual BL, because it features a BL story within the story. To be honest, due to the slow pace I kept forgetting the storyline of that story-in-a-story; if anyone read and remembers, please enlighten me.
Finished this 日本語学習者’s classic, it was a very interesting read, very typical of Murata-sensei. As someone who feels themself somewhere on the spectrum, I really like her main character’s ways of unusual thinking. I would definitely be up for more episodes of what things Keiko has to deal with, I mean, 18 years of conbini life? Let me have the workplace drama from her point of view!
A pretty forgettable BL, cute but I would say nothing that catches my eye. The overacting you see sometimes in Japanese live-action is veeeeery over the top here, tbh it was kinda annoying to me at points. The food looks okay, but nothing compared to きのう何食べた？ | L25
The messages in this one about gender-identity and self-exploration are really good, but I found that I just cannot watch high school animes anymore. Strangely enough, I can read high school light novels just fine, not sure what’s the cause here. I’ve been reading high school cheesy fluffy romance BL back to back, but I don’t get that cringe that I feel when watching it animated.
I watched this mainly for the interesting premise. A high school teacher finds out she’s reliving the last year of her graduation class, after she died being pushed off a ledge by one of her students-now she has to find out who did it, and a way to prevent it.
There’s a looooot of motivational speeches in this one, and while they’re pretty cringe, I still got the the end finding myself strangely attached to everyone. It is a bit cheesy how easily the bad are turned good, but somehow it still spoke to me in the end. Maybe because it had such a wrap-up feeling, I don’t know if I can describe it better. It felt like things were moving, and people had actual character growth (even though the turning point felt a bit forced).
I haven’t updated in a while, mostly because nothing really is happening. I’m just keeping up with my normal study routine and just reading. Being in need for some serotonin release, I’m looking for ways to spice things up again. Right now I’m thinking about re-starting Wanikani (I reset after reaching level ~40 about 3 years ago), but this time speed-running it, only leveling radicals/kanji. It doesn’t feel necessary for my studying, but I’m just looking for some odd challenges.
Speaking of challenges, the Readathon challenge was a great distraction, and while I do feel a bit exhausted after it, I kept the habit of reading daily so far. Will definitely join again. Shoutout to @monace for hosting it.
There’s a live action version? 
Too bad it doesn’t seem right be streaming here….
Lately I’ve been watching 孤独のグルメ S1 | L26 which isn’t BL but does have lots of food. Its on YouTube!
I watch it on Netflix using VPN (and I think it’s on Gagaolala for the BL enthusiasts).
孤独のグルメ was already recommended to me a lot, I think I need to watch it sooner or later
I also watched it on Netflix JP with a VPN, it was so good. You can even even use Proton VPN for free because Japan is one of their free country servers (but sometimes it takes a while for the fastest server to be Japan so it can be frustrating).
It’s super good. I absolutely devoured (ha) the two seasons.
After playing around a bit on kotu.io, I added a pitch deck to my Renshuu decks (I think it’s PRO user-only).
You can change H/L for each mora by tapping the mora. The kotu minimal pairs showed me that I am already quite alright at distinguishing the pitch patterns, but it’s not really useful for anything else. Assigning pitch to vocab is already a step harder, I get about 60-75% correct.
Not all words on there have pitch info, but I can quiz about 6k words, so that’s probably plenty enough.
