Finally sat down and got through chapter 2 today.
I thought it was a somewhat interesting chapter that yet again rolled me on vocab, ended up making around 43 flash cards. I made sure I understood the gist of what was happening in the boat scene, but decided to just skim most of the nautical terminology besides the obvious ones.
As others mentioned, there’s definitely an undercurrent of underage fetishization going on, and similar to how I felt about the previous chapter’s faux pas, I’ll just acknowledge it and keep going. I’m still enjoying the writing style quite a lot, and the face plant scene got a good laugh out of me. Also just in general I find ティラナ (not sure how to romanize her name) giving off haughty yet clueless vibes to be really funny.
I burst out laughing at that, it reminded me of Lucy from Servant X Service since I re-watched it a couple of weeks ago
Also just finished the chapter and same, I kind of think this is why the katakana names are proving so hard for me. They don’t map to anything my brain acknowledges as “name” and there’s a ton of them so it’s like being introduced to a whole group of people, all with names you’ve never heard before, and being quizzed on who is who 5 minutes later. I need something for my brain to hook onto if I’m going to have this much new info.
Maybe this is why I’m not that into fantasy in Japanese
Also echoing all on what-the-fetishization and politely ignoring and forgetting that
crotch faceplant scene
I will say it’s an interesting(?) change as for a while there I was picking up books that incidentally featured older woman/young man pairings. Only one of them underage sketch though (mentioned above, a mystery club pick) - the rest were college students + cougars.
Phew. I never would’ve gotten Tilarna out of ティラナ. And forget the last name, I had completely given up on that.
Granted, I haven’t read much Japanese fantasy (yet), but from what I’ve read so far it feels very similar to English fantasy, insofar as some authors go for “generic” fantasy names, and other really want to flex that “exotic fantasy person” muscle. I figure it’s all exposure; the more strange names you can learn to identify with real characters, the more accepting your brain is of oddly-spelled stuff.
Given all that, I had to double-check how to spell ティラナ’s name myself for this very post. Oddly, I think the fact that I’m reading these names vertically but have to type them out horizontally is also messing with my head.
Fair. Thinking on it while I did read fantasy in English when I was younger, I leaned heavily towards sci-fi if given the choice and of the fantasy books I enjoyed most didn’t employ the really out-there fantasy names. Maybe this is a thing for me in both languages
Personally, I am bad at remembering names IRL. I have given up on remembering names in books. I recognize the name when I read and it gives me the correlating image in my head but I rarely actually “read”.
Tbf, Japanese also don’t read Katakana strings. It was the actual plot twist in a book.
Oddly, I think the fact that I’m reading these names vertically but have to type them out horizontally is also messing with my head.
I recognize the name when I read and it gives me the correlating image in my head but I rarely actually “read”.