What are you reading today?

It took me 350pages to figure out what the heck is on the cover, I thought the guy had 3 legs for quite a while

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It seems reasonable to me that maga tends to be rated as easier. Fewer text makes it less exhausting to read. The pictures makes it easier to understand and gives you confidence that you understand what is going on. Manga also often consists of dialogue exclusively, whereas novels have descriptions, narration and internal monologue which all uses different vocabulary.

Personally I’ve read quite a few manga, and I’m generally quite comfortable with them now. Sure, I struggle sometimes. But my general expectation with manga is that I’ll be okay. Novels are still intimidating and I still try to choose what I read by looking for easy things.

I think being used to the medium is also important. If you start with manga because (rightfully or not) you think it’s easier for beginners, you won’t have much practice with novels when you start them. And that lack of practice is going to make novels seem harder. Honestly, I tend to think that almost all manga are easier then almost all novels. I’m not saying that’s literally or objectively the case, just how I feel about it.

I imagine people that are simply much more interested in novels than manga will have a different experience. They’ll have started reading novels early on and probably won’t percive the same difference in difficulty.

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What the heck; the more I stare at it, the most I get the impression he’s been cut off at the waist.

Okay, this is it. This is the weekend I start 薬屋のひとりごと 2 | L37. I meant to start earlier this week, but work was absolutely awful, plus various airport-related shenanigans.

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Today I continued on with 世にも奇妙な商品カタログ 2. Let’s see what the remaining stories will be about.
Also I started with:

Which is a bit above my level actually, but I will work trough it slowly. Still it is fun to read, at least for me.

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Currently reading volume 5. So far (~25% in) things are fine, but, just like volume 4, a large portion of the book is taken up by short stories. I can’t say that I was convinced by those, so I’m not really looking forward to the end of this volume :sweat_smile:

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Currently reading 裏世界ピクニック2 | 33

Really enjoying the series so far.

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I was about to say something, but I think it’s still a spoiler for you considering the pages you marked as read :speak_no_evil:

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Good day, my fellow Natively readers, I hope you are all having another great day of reading today.

Recently, I have been reading 恋する・ヴァンパイア | L31 and I’m about 50% through now. I bought it off of Amazon on a whim (there were 0 reviews on the Amazon page) because I felt the sudden need to read something 吸血鬼 related. I usually don’t even like romance, but if it has 吸血鬼, sign me up!

It’s not horrible considering that I came in with zero expectations. I’m not saying it’s great (it’s a vampire romance novel, what do you expect?), but I certainly find it more bearable to read than the so-called “Mommy LN” that I forced myself through. Though, to be fair, I think I would read anything in this genre without too many complaints. I’ll gladly read any garbage as long as it has 吸血鬼 in it. Difficulty-wise, it feels somewhere between コンビニ人間 and 夜市 right now but it’s been a while so I might have to go take a look back at those before I grade them.

I think I’ve added at least 100 more 吸血鬼-related books and series at this point, so I’m probably not going to run out of material to read any time soon.

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Sounds like you’re working your way up to the Monogatari Series!

(Whether it’s garbage is up to you though!)

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Yes! I think some of my end-games would be that and ヴぁんぷ! | L30?? but a while ago I took a quick glance at the texts just to see how difficult they were and I don’t think I’ll be reading them any time soon. (物語 and ヴぁんぷ! are both 9/10 difficulty on jpdb :smiling_face_with_tear:) Though, I don’t have any reason to believe Monogatari wouldn’t be a good read. It’s highly praised and I’ve never seen anyone call it garbage. I’ll (hopefully) get there one day, I just have to keep reading!

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Having watched the anime adaption of Monogatari, I’d certainly expect it to be difficult. And yeah, I wouldn’t call it garbage. I would call it… occasionally uncomfortable. The main character occasionally does things that are awkward or morally questionable (“questionable” being a bit generous), which takes away from the series a bit for me. That said, I did enjoy it overall, and it certainly seems up your alley if you like vampires (especially if you also like other supernatural stuff).

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Currently reading 火車 by 宮部みゆき. I’d read the translated version many years ago and enjoyed it, so I also wanted to give the original work a try. It’s over 500 pages so it will end up being the longest book I will have read in Japanese.

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Ooh I might be reading that soon. Which is to say possibly later in the summer :sweat_smile: I read several books at once so finishing any one takes awhile

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That’s me too. I have a short attention span so I do get bored in the middle of books, even interesting ones, so I always start another book hahaha.

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Today I finally finished 本好き volume 16, which I’d been procrastinating for a couple days. Besides that I just read a chapter of きんいろモザイク volume 3.

Now that I finished 本好き volume 16 I will go back and finish the first volume of 薬屋のひとりごと. I’m 70% done already, but I took a break because I needed an easier read while on a short trip a few weeks ago.

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I’d say so too. And the hardest part of novels (for me anyway), is descriptions. An author can spend pages delicately setting a scene, picking some metaphors, etc. The same goes for action scenes, picturing those can be difficult. In a manga? Someone draws those and hopefully very well :slight_smile:

I also presume the Bookworm manga is published under a 少年, so there might be full furigana and little descriptive bits for tricky stuff (like references).

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Im curious what you were going to say :upside_down_face:? Im at 87% now

I see you’ve read a few of them are you sure the spoiler is for book 2 :sweat_smile:

Hi, first time posting here :saluting_face:

Today I will probably start 斉木楠雄のΨ難 12 | L27 or 名探偵コナン 18 | L25. I’ve been also thinking on starting やはり俺の青春ラブコメはまちがっている。 but first I want to finish some of the series I have on “reading”.

よろしく!

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I’ve read 2 volumes and am really enjoying it so far, it’s one of those series you read with a constant smile :smile:

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