Any spoilers, for the current chapters must be behind spoilers or detail curtains. When we get further in you don’t need to hide details that were revealed in previous chapters.
Always mention where you are in the book when discussing, ideally by chapter 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 can be part of the discussion too and I’m sure some folks would be happy to help.
Even if you don’t read the chapter(s) in time, you are still encouraged to post in the thread for that reading once you have finished it. I advise not reading ahead in the threads as you may see spoilers.
I’ve listened to the audiobook for the next chapters but my comprehension is still pretty low. I have downloaded the ebook for the junior version and tbh, it’s not helped much except for the furigana. My vocabulary level is too low to understand it so I’m doing very frequent look ups.
Listening to the book, I’m picking up word’s here and there that I know but otherwise I’ve no clue and I completely missed the bit in the prologue about how she ended up where she is so although I’m listening with the club, my reading times are going to be a lot slower. Think I’ll need to re-visit this at some point but I’ll buy the rest of the series since I have the audiobooks and hate to leave things half collected
What’s the difference between 父親 and 父さん? I noticed the MC refers to Urano’s father as 父親 and Myne’s as 父さん, but the Korean just uses the same word, 아빠.
I’m just a few pages into this week’s reading, and I very much enjoyed the image of Myne dying inside as Tuuli praises her toileting skills!
In other settings, you’ll also hear aristocratic, royal, or super formal characters add 上 - like 父上 ちちうえ to mean something like “my esteemed father” (at least that’s how I translate it in my head)
Caught up! I’m almost entirely using the audiobook now, barely glancing at the text. Not sure if this makes it the best reading practice but I’m enjoying it and getting through it quickly! I should probably stop multitasking while doing it so I retain more though haha.
So, the thing I wanted to say last week was that, since
the main character has Main’s memory (or, technically, IS Main with Urano’s memory), I just realized that it makes no sense that she wouldn’t know that there are no books in the house. After all, even if she keeps being sick and sleeping, they have a single living space, she would have noticed it. The fact she doesn’t even know the word for book should be a dead giveaway. I guess she could have been confused at the beginning, but after a while, she should have noticed.
Oh well, I didn’t think about it the last times (plural) I read that part, anyway.
Those words serve different functions. 父親 is the technical term for father. You could replace it by “male parent” or something like that (so the emphasis is on the role). 父さん is an informal way of calling one’s father (so that’s a way to call a person).
That’s not relevant here In particular, it’s a different use of (お)父さん here.
I think this is partly explained as Main has been just sick and almost in bed her entire time.
She not only did not know the word for book, but also doesn’t have any knowledge of some other basic stuff around her.
I won’t give any examples yet, as I’m unsure if they are minor spoilers, as I’ve read the entire book, I do have to take a glance to see if it has been going over or not before disclosing it.
Yes, and I thought it made sense before… but not this time around. Thinking about it, the use cases she had in mind would mean that the [things] would have been around her at some point. But they were not. I have no problem believing she never saw the storage before, though.
Anyway, it’s super minor, but reading (well, listening to, technically) the part about getting Main memories last week, I realized that this part was kinda strange. I’m going to put it on her not being able to believe it’s possible.
While this can also be the case, take in mind that being constantly (or almost constantly) in fever can make your attention span, memory retention, and overall awareness be very low.
Not sure if it has been mentioned already in the book, but Maine before Urano has been said that she didn’t put much interest in quite a few things before. (very minor detail that might be in the very near future)
But, in the scenario she was picturing with children books, those would have be read to the kids on a regular basis (especially if she expects ~10 of them being around). She should have realized something was wrong.
Although she has Myne’s memories, the original Myne wouldn’t necessarily remember everything about her life (or perhaps she wouldn’t have the ability to easily retrieve less important memories), especially as she’s so young. So “new” Myne just assumes that books weren’t important enough to “old” Myne for her to remember.
New Myne might assume that Old Myne’s memories are not totally available to her yet, and since they’re still transferring over to her, the “book” memories just haven’t arrived yet.
Denial and/or desperation. Books are like air to Urano/New Myne, so being without them impairs her ability to think straight, or she just can’t accept the thought that there aren’t any books available. Since reading is so vital to her, she can’t stop searching for books any more than someone struggling to breathe wouldn’t decide they don’t need oxygen anymore.
She doesn’t even think about Old Myne’s memories. She’s just Urano in a new environment and she needs books!
Without going into specifics or revealing spoilers, could anyone who has read further into the series tell me if Myne reflects back on her life as Urano or if the prologue is just a setup for the story? She has mentioned her life as Urano before, but they’ve just been simple observations, like “this was easier in my previous life” or “this world doesn’t have this convenient thing I’m used to”. I’m thinking about more introspective things, such as how she lived her life, her relationships, how her family and friends are coping without her (or whether others also died in the earthquake?)… Obviously she’s in a new environment (and a new body!), so there’s a lot going on, but wouldn’t she think about/care about her old life?
This may have been mentioned before, but as I was reading another few pages today, it struck me as so sad that old Myne died and has been replaced, and her family doesn’t even know… I mean, they’re spared the heartache of losing a daughter/sister, but old Myne seems so pitiful. Dying so young, and not even being mourned by those you loved…
I would say a combination of the last two, myself.
There’s one short story at the end of the volume. Otherwise yes, but not in this arc.
They don’t (at this point at least), because that would be insane to think something like that would happen. Plus, she is 5 and apparently (previous part) didn’t interact that well verbally. They would definitely notice a change, but it’s more along the lines of “oh, she is getting better and growing up”. (And being weird, but they don’t have much to compare to).
Reading about Myne venturing outside of her house and going to the market with her mother brought back personal memories of when I moved abroad for the first time. I was around Urano’s age and it was my first proper time outside my home country and I was just as surprised about everything and struggling to adapt to the new culture. So, I feel like that part of the book is very believable (plus she’s a child cognitively…kinda… her reactions are probably even more…childish? ).
On a language related note, rereading this in Korean after having read it in Japanese once is very weird. Sometimes I experience almost an optical? Cognitive? Illusion that I’m actually reading in Japanese because of how things are phrased/the similarities of the two languages. After reading some sentences, the thought, “oh the original Japanese sentence is xyz” automatically pops up in my head. I don’t think the translation is bad or anything (I haven’t even read enough in Korean yet to be able to even make a judgement like that ) but I can tell somehow that it wasn’t written by a Korean author.
Looking forward to the next chapters already but I want to keep pace with the club and not read ahead so I shall wait. I hope everyone’s having a fun time reading and a nice week!
A small translation/localization question. The English translation translates 布団 (ふとん) as “comforter” in the section where Myne is standing on it to open the bedroom door. I would have assumed it meant 敷布団 (しきぶとん) rather than 掛け布団 (掛け布団), and I can’t quite tell from the illustration.
It’s hard to imagine rolling up a comforter adding any significant height difference, but rolling/folding up a futon certainly would. Any thoughts on which it is?
Edit: she also slides it across the floor, after she falls, and then note that that section of the floor seems suddenly cleaner. That also suggests mattress rather than comforter to me (otherwise why would she need to slide it, and would it really make that much impact?)
I always thought it was a 掛け布団. Depending how thick it is (and it’s nearly winter), rolling one up could give you 20~30 cm of extra height. No matter how small Main is, she can’t be so small that she needs more than that to reach the doorknob.
Plus, they don’t have rollable 敷き布団, they are sleeping on (I don’t think it’s well established yet; the first explicit mention I found was in volume 2… Main does describe the sensation in last week’s part though) straw beds, which I think would be impossible to roll up (especially not with her lack of strength)
Ahhh good points. I tried rolling up a light comforter I have just now, and if I rolled + folded it in half, I got close to 20cm… So I guess that makes sense then. Thx!
These were some enjoyable chapters, it’s fun seeing how Myne acts in ways that are too mature for a 5-year-old and then later do things that are too childish for a 20-year-old, lol.
After the end of chapter 4, I wonder if the temple will be her first chance to see any kind of writing system beyond numbers. A world w/o a printing press would restrict book availability pretty hard, but a temple might have some kind of religious teachings/scriptures written down that could be a little more readily available for the general public.
Looking forward to next week!
Finished this week’s reading! Took me a while to find the time due to work being busy, but ironically it’s due to work I could sit down and read this morning. (Had to work late last night, so I got to come in late this morning.) Three cheers for the audiobook; even sleep-deprived I was able to follow along reasonably well. I need to go into the past and smack previous-eefara and they’ll myself to work on my listening earlier.
At this point I’ve already passed how far I made it (somewhere in chapter 3) last time I tried reading this book. It’s a shame I stopped where I did; it was really fun going out into town in chapter 4 and getting a peek at the world.
I don’t know when we finally get books, but I hope it’s a long, long time from now. Given the chance, I could totally see Myne plopping down and doing nothing for the rest of the series if so. Please find more than a single reason to live, Myne.
It’s going to be hilarious if she gets her hands on a temple book only to realize that books are not yet written in the vernacular in this world. Completely unintelligible even if she knew the letters.
In particular, it’s a different use of (お)父さん here.
I hope everyone’s having a fun time reading and a nice week!
