The cycle of pain continues.
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The latest volume of 女装してめんどくさい事になってるネクラとヤンキーの両片想い | L25 came out today and I insta bought it. I thought I’d be good and finish reading my current novel first (幻想古書店で珈琲を 青薔薇の庭園へ | L31) because I’m getting behind schedule to finish my bingo card… but I just can’t focus 
But if I just binge 女装 now, I’ll have to wait again a billion years until the next volume and I spoiled to myself that this volume has some tension/cliffhanger at the end.
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Been a few weeks, so lots of updates from me!
I finished いなくなくならなくならないで | L31 and really enjoyed it.
It definitely became a bit of a whirlwind as the book went on. Felt to me like it deserved its Akutagawa nomination.
I also read Kaori Ekuni’s 旅ドロップ (小学館文庫 え 4-6) | L27 while I was travelling about in France. Really nice holiday read I could drop into easily, and gave me a bit of extra joy for travelling.
But did get a bit repetitive, half my fault, since I read it over 3 days or so.
Aaand I’ve just finished 「『ジューシー』ってなんですか?」 | L30 - billed as a 職場小説 around the team writing TV/Radio schedules.
I found this one pretty deadly dull, but the second separate story 「ああ、懐かしの肌色クレヨン」really sweet. So you win some you lose some 
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And also - I went to the Châtelet BookOff in Paris, and there were a decent number of Japanese books!
So three 1 euro books onto my TBR pile!
Two Kaori Ekuni short story collections,
つめたいよるに | L30 ,
泳ぐのに、安全でも適切でもありません | L30?? ,
and also
その街の今は | L30??, which is apparently an ode to pre-gentrification south Osaka. So also sounds kinda interesting
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You are having the same mini 江國香織 phase I had. 
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In one of the books I’m reading, Char A calls Char B, bc A misses B, but doesn’t want to admit it, when pressed. B calls A cute, and says Aってば、ウサギみたい. A replies ウサギの話は迷信だ。
Is this what they’re referring to?
I’m not learned in Japanese folklore, but if I read that I would’ve guessed they are refering to the “rabbits can die of loneliness” thing. Cute video though!
“Aってば”, I assume? And what’s with the *?
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Ohhhh that’s probably exactly it! Thx
Yes, whoops. The * was cuz I originally wrote it as あなたってば, and was gonna asterisk that they didn’t actually use あなた… But then I rewrote it, and forgot the asterisk was there, cuz I’m tired. Fixed it now
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Later on, the main character describes what that friendship means to him to another character, who sums it up as:
結婚を前提にしたお付き合い、みたいなものかな
It’s bait. I know it’s bait. I’m being baited.
Author, you keep telling things, but you better deliver on them. Or else I will be disappointed and my day will be ruined
That’s only 3* for you.
Speaking of only 3*, I also read 女装してめんどくさい事になってるネクラとヤンキーの両片想い 13巻 | L25 in the end, which was disappointing.
Mostly, I don’t like the way the author is dealing with a character that, from my point of view, is clearly a trans woman, but everybody (including the character) insists is just a guy with a crossdressing “hobby”. A hobby that is being carried out 24/7, I guess. The tension with “his” wife (who has been living separately for a few years since she thought the women stuff in the house were a sign of cheating) is solved by just coming out and her being bi, so like, no problem. Well, that was easy. As the bi mention implies, the character passes 100%, and in-between chapter extra info states that “he” starts modeling later (as a woman, on top of being fem 24/7). Typical guy behavior, I guess. And, like, I could be convinced that the character indeed just like to present feminine without that being related to gender (or that they are non-binary, or gender fluid, or something) but there’s literally no hint of that.
One of the main character was showing signs of gender dysphoria in the previous volume, but that makes me feel like there won’t be any satisfying progress in that direction.
One half of the book was just stalling, one third was bonus stories that provide pretty much nothing… so now I know why the current situation is not solved yet in the chapter ahead. Almost nothing happened.
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Lol. The author knows exactly what they’re doing, with pinpoint accuracy. Thank you for being the vanguard in this mess. o7
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Funny enough, I ran into almost the exact same line, after reading your comment last night
「･･････恋人になることを前提にした、お友達付き合い、みたいな」
「 それって、結婚を前提にしたお付き合い、的な? お友達から始めましょうってやつ」
「俺もうまく言えないけど、そんな感じ･･････だと思う」
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Well, 結婚を前提にしたお付き合い is a standard expression (with many playful variations) so I’m not surprised.
I’ve seen it used as is in a manga I read recently (it’s err TL, so it won’t ever be in here, but whatever)
There’s something around the line of チェスを前提にした結婚 in Silent Witch as well (and people telling the guy it’s dumb)
I’ve seen it in other places but can’t remember.
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Mm, I gathered it was a common saying - tho I don’t remember running into it before (besides the first time I read this). So it was a nice coincidence either way
That’s kind of amazing. How’s the series? Sounds like something I might wanna read
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That reminds me, I finally got back into こみっくがーるず and one of the characters is a TL mangaka. She’s super embarrassed by it but it’s what she’s good at drawing. Here’s a page where she’s taking suggestions for a T-shirt design for the school sports day and is accidentally letting her drawing tendencies show.
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I didn’t stick with the anime, but the manga seems like I might enjoy it. I’ll have to remember to try it one of these days
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I read about 55 pages of 異神千夜 | L35?? last night – it’s really good and I wanted to see what the end of the first story was. OTOH that meant I didn’t get to sleep til about 1am, which was a bit dumb…
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The series is pretty fun! It’s very much an overpowered-protagonist-goes-to-magic-school story, with a fun cast of characters. I’ve been slowly working through it a couple volumes a year but @Naphthalene has read further into it iirc
So one of my 2024 goals was to read through all my physical manga, and I’ve been doing a terrible job this year. A couple of weeks ago I decided I probably needed to be a little more proactive, and kinda soft-decided to try to read two books a week. This won’t zero me out by the end of the year, but it’ll make some progress and put me in a good place for next year.
Anyway, here’s what I’ve read so far as part of my renewed effort:
- 漫画「天官賜福」日本語翻訳版 第1巻 | L32
- ギンモクセイの仕立て屋 上 | L24
- D.Gray-man 7 | L25
- D.Gray-man 8 | L25
- 四ノ宮くんには理由がある 1 | L27
- ギンモクセイの仕立て屋 下 | L24
And what I’m working on now:
I’m tempted to spend my WK readathon time working through a whole bunch of manga to really pump up those numbers, but haven’t really decided yet. Part of my goal is read some good new manga I already own, and part of the goal is to find the stuff I don’t like as much so I can donate them and free up bookshelf space. 
I’ve also got a library tag for all my physical non-manga stuff, but I don’t have any particular goal to finish those off this year. Could potentially be a good stretch goal for next year if I can finish off the manga in a reasonable amount of time, but we’ll see.
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Is anyone getting this error when trying to order physical manga from Amazon Japan?
You cannot buy this item because it’s out of stock
The items are all clearly in stock, so I don’t know what’s going on. I think they might be blocking my IP or something, but it’s weird since this is for a physical order anyway…
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If you link the thing where it’s happening I can try for you. (I mean, if it happens before you actually send the order.)
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