Finished volume 2 of 野ばらの森の乙女たち 2 | L17 and it sure does… just end. 
The intense levels of drama in this volume made me a laugh a little too.
Still, I think it’s a solid early read for people specifically looking for yuri or shoujo. Mostly school and romance vocab, with a tiny bit of rich people vocab thrown in. Grammar is extremely simple and there’s usually spaces between words without kanji.
でしょう！？ I loved all the drama though, personally 
I don’t know, it felt like it was meant as a “funny” scene.
Anyway, volumes 2 and 3 are free to read until the 17th, so I’m going to read at least volume 2. Not sure I’ll have enough time for volume 3, we’ll see.
Hmmm I wonder if I’m thinking of how the anime handles it then? I vaguely remember some part where the girls just stop talking to him for a while - which this seems like the likely candidate for. Could be that it’s been too long, and I’m misremembering.
Look forward to vol 2 thoughts
Just popping in to pat myself on the back for being able to start reading again. Work was really busting my butt this summer. I think I’ve finally gotten things calmed down enough to continue my japanese studies though. (I work IT for a middle school)
Continuing on with 恐怖コレクター2. It’s nothing crazy, but for whatever reason, I’ve been really enjoying the series so far. It’s very 世にも奇妙な商品カタログ adjacent, but I feel like it’s a much better series for me. 世にも奇妙な商品カタログ vol 2 was fantastic to me, but I’ve felt a little lukewarm about the volumes I read after.
Doing pretty bad at getting through the things I intended to read this year but oh well. As long as I’m reading in general I think I’m happy with that right now.
The end felt like someone told the mangaka she needed to wrap it up in two chapters because the series was getting cancelled. When Izumi got back together with what’s-her-face i was like GIRL NO she jumped out of a window after she failed to manipulate you, thats the biggest red flag. Just stay away!!!
Also the other couple just felt entirely unenrolled. Was not at all convinced that the main girl has suddenly become attracted to her best friend, after spending the whole story nearly in a relationship with the idol girl (I’ve of course forgotten everyone’s names)
Tbh as a reader I was more bothered by that part. Tho I should have assumed it, based on the covers
I just finished 泳ぐのに、安全でも適切でもありません | L30?? , and I loved it!
It hits the sweet spot of being an easy read and not being about YA/school drama, so I’d definitely recommend to anyone wanting something like that.
I wrote a review, but tldr, it’s short stories roughly fitting into the theme ‘neither safe nor suitable romances’
Well, I’m 80% through volume 3, so signs point to “yes”.
Volume 2 was enjoyable, but I thought that the end was too “clean” (and a literal deus ex machina).
Volume 3 has been kinda slow, and I feel like the main characters are getting a bit too strong… plus the whole thing with チョコ better get somewhere else than just “and now she’s dead”, because it really felt like a waste of time
Ah yes, that looks very different. Apparently the change was not even consistent, since whoever wrote that doesn’t understand why one of the characters is apologizing. It would make complete sense with the book version (but there was no apologizing scene)
Edit: I finished volume 3 and the free preview of 4, and I don’t really feel like going further at the moment. It was an okay read, so I’ll probably come back to it at some point I guess.
Despite thinking that I liked it better than the anime (which had to condense/modify to fit into 12 eps), I don’t remember the details of the plot/end at this point. I’ll have to look it up I guess
So the anime skips over the actual bath scene, and only released it as an OVA afterwards. So I can see why the reviewer would be confused.
Re: character strength - don’t worry, they’ll be back to being underpowered or just competently powered again
Is that the one that has like the 75-100ish pg battle scene at the fort or whatever? I apparently liked it, but I can see why you’d feel that way about チョコ… And iirc it did end with “and she’s dead”, didn’t it?
That’s fair. I vaguely remember feeling like things were too dragged out in those volumes, but starting from vol 5 the writing improves substantially, imo (more interesting supporting cast, actual adventuring rather than just grinding, the author learns the power of summary starting in volume 6, and reasonably sized chapter breaks in volume 7, etc)
Rewatched the anime, finished 灰と幻想のグリムガル level.7 彼方の虹 | L31 and started 灰と幻想のグリムガル level.8 そして僕らは明日を待つ | L31
While Vol 7 still had some elements I’m not so fond of (Ranta still exists and is non-stop with the perverted comments and obnoxiousness and Haruhiro is still overly gloomy and hard on himself), it was overall an interesting little diversion.
The party is in another “start from scratch” phase, bc they’ve just entered another new world. And while that meant the first 1/3rd had a lot of setup and grinding, the world building and adventuring portions were interesting enough, and even exciting at some parts, following that.
There were 2 really nice heart to hearts, one between ハルヒロ and シホル, and the other in a bath scene, with the guys. Speaking of bath scenes, there was an incredibly satisfying moment where Ranta tried to pull the same shit as in volume 1, and was immediately and painfully pinned down by another male party member
It was interesting the author went through a large display of the giant orc city , and tbh they seemed fairly civilized/developed.
I found the end a bit unsatisfyingly executed, but also I was so glad not to have to read another long battle. In general, this volume is very good about keeping the fighting portions within reasonable limits
Vol 8 is off to a much more interesting and active start!
The party has to temporarily split into pairs shortly in, which opens up some really overdue conversations within the party. The biggest surprise though is that there have been several sections with Ranta’s inner monologue - which has actually been kinda interesting (he’s not a total PoS, despite how he acts). There was also some really nice & interesting discussion btwn (this first pair will major spoil something in vol 3) シホル and クザク and some really great discussion and partnership with ハルヒロ & ユメ (who are honestly my fav pair, esp when it comes to teamwork, and have been since vol 1)
Unfortunately, I’ve spoiled myself on a few long term plot points this past week… So I know there’s some foundations being set that I don’t like, but… there’s also an event I’m really looking forward to, later in this book (Ranta finally leaves the party!! I’m so curious to see how things are without him.)
Anyway I’m really glad I picked the series back up. It’s been a nice change of pace, and a good “see? This isn’t as hard as you think it is”… Hopefully I can just keep going with them for a while
I guess that’s the case, but I’m not happy about it being because the author achieved it by just killing off the strongest character. Also, his death makes no sense. You can revive someone (in real life) up to 6 minutes after they stopped breathing, and they have magic. No matter how banged up he got, it seems very weird without extra explanation.
Yes, but that’s not the part I didn’t like. I didn’t like the setup phase (with ランタ spending pages after pages of not saying what was happening on purpose) and the チョコ flashback that has no impact whatsoever. ハルヒロ immediately forgets about it too.
As far as I know. The character list at the beginning of volume 4 isn’t as definitive, but that doesn’t mean anything.
That’s not really what I meant… even if he had lived in this case, they’ll start to encounter much higher classes of enemies and adventurers, and more complex situations than they’ve had to deal with so far, etc. so it never gets too power creep
Idrc anything specific about Moguzo’s death, so I’ll take your word for it. I do like that it happened tho, even if it was poorly written. (Nothing against him)
You have my sympathies and agreement there. (I didn’t dislike the big battle either, was just trying to get my bearings)
Re: チョコ - yeah, that’s the end of her then
August Manga Reading Challenge, Week 2
Has it only been one week since my last update? I could swear at least two, maybe two and a half have passed… I’ve got a much more normal amount of manga read this time, haha. Part of it is I’m not counting an extra week’s worth in the tally, and part of it is is that that extra week had weird working hours which ended up giving me an extra 2-3 hours in the day, which I was free to use on reading. I’ve bene aiming to read one manga per day if at all possible, but I was, as you can see, only partially successful last week. No big deal, though; all were good books. Onward to the thoughts!
Completed books:
Reviews/Thoughts:
憂国のモリアーティ 20 : So this is one of those “I’ve caught up to the English and now I don’t want to wait a year+ for the next English release to come out, so I’ll just jump on over to the Japanese” series, where when you check my library I have weird gaps in which volumes I’ve recorded read because they’ve been in different languages. I’ve been a fan of 憂国 since picking up volume 1 some years back; it’s been a pretty straightforward series about people doing bad things for the greater good, with relatively uncomplicated plots and characters. I think reading it in the original has enhanced my appreciation of the series, though: it’s forced me to read slower and savor everything a bit more.
It’s difficult to tell reading the English, but I feel like (based on all of one volume read in Japanese, haha) this may be a good series for someone looking to practice reading more formal speech: the majority of our characters move around in high society and their speech reflects it, but the underlying plot and moment-by-moment events are not particularly complicated so you have less to get worry about getting tripped up on there.
There’s a series of LNs/manga set in between arcs 1 and 2 of this series (of which volume 20 starts arc 2) that I’ve been wanting to read for a while, but I’ve been incredibly indecisive about which version I want to read…
贋 : Another volume 1 of a Harta series I’ve had on my shelf for a bit. I enjoyed this first book and will certainly be reading more down the line. This was another difficult case of “how do I grade this?”: relatively sparse text, but when they do speak half the time it’s describing 昭和-era art techniques. 
I haven’t read many Harta series so far, granted (I have a few more digital volume 1s to get through), but I’ve been impressed with how much I’ve liked the ones I’ve read so far; they’ve all been quite different from each other, and their print quality has been top-notch.
氷の魔物の物語 : This was another one of my long series I’ve been slowly picking at and have wanted to read during this month’s challenge; this book starts a new arc, and I think I’d like to try to get through the rest of the arc this month. Not sure how many volumes it’ll end up being, maybe three or four. 
Anyway, I picked up this volume thinking it would be a breezy read since I’m somewhat familiar with the story already, but it continues to sneak up on me as relatively more text-dense than I’m expecting. 
椎名くんの鳥獣百科 2 : I didn’t like this one as much as volume one, as I really enjoyed the focus in that volume on the main character and his relationships, rather than introducing new characters. I’ve noticed that’s become a bit of a pattern in some of the manga I’ve read that tend towards more SOL vibes: they introduce a new character per chapter or two, but the new characters never really act to complement the main cast in any way; they’re just there…because? Anyway, the last chapter or two of this volume did swing back more towards what I appreciated in volume one, so I’m hoping the author just needed time to introduce a few people they didn’t have time to in volume one.
Oddly, I felt like this volume was the easiest read out of all four from this week, despite this being set in a university with animal researchers, two things I have little experience with in other books. I’m thinking all the new characters are what softened the difficulty here, as most of the text dealt with them being kooky/insecure, which is generally an easy read.
As noted in my 氷 thoughts, maybe it would be a good idea to start earmarking specific manga volumes I’d like to finish this month to give myself a bit of guidance now that we’re halfway through. I’ve eaten through most of my remaining singleton volumes, so the vast majority remaining are series, which I feel like I’ll need to set specific goal volumes for to keep myself on track. I tend to get bored /distracted away from longer series if there’s not outside motivation keeping me on track (cliffhangers, being on a deadline, a club, etc.), which is one reason my TBR physical manga has felt like it hasn’t really budged despite me trying to work my way through it.
I’ll probably see if I can start scoping things out today after work, see if I can get a sense of what I’d like to do. The only series I haven’t touched yet from my wishlist this month is 魔入りました!入間くん | L28, so I need to make sure that makes its way in at some point. Perhaps I should just focus on one/two longer series instead, though, and finally get some of them checked off… Options, options…
After all that talk about https://learnnatively.com/book/dd5c9ef9f9/ here and since I do own the first volume, I’ve been reading this book the past few days. I had some trouble getting into it for the first third or half (certain unlikable characters in the main group didn’t help 
), but I enjoyed the second half quite a bit. I did in fact read most of the second half today. Compared to other ‘game-like’ isekai/LN in general, the progress felt pretty realistic.
I liked that too! Kikkawa and Ranta can go be annoying somewhere else… but I found this concept really refreshing.
That was so unexpected! Not unrealistic, and very important character development wise. And done well enough to make me sad, although at that point I wasn’t really feeling the book yet.
Good to know; I’m not planning to continue at the moment (backlog gets priority) but if it ends up on unlimited again I’ll probably pick it back up.
Other than that, I’ve been reading 魔女の宅急便 4 | L26 for a week now, at the leisurely pace of one chapter a day. Today I couldn’t resist and read 2. I love the whimsical atmosphere, and Kiki’s growth in each book feels relevant and well paced. I’ll probably finish tomorrow. 
Fwiw Kikkawa is a very minor side character, and won’t show up all that often iirc. I actually momentarily was like “who TF is Kikkawa?” (There’s a lot of side characters, I forget names). I actually find him kind of enjoyable (but wouldn’t irl). Ranta on the other hand…
That’s one of my favorite things! With a few exceptions it doesn’t feel like a video game imitation (tho I like those too). Also I love that adventuring isn’t some high, noble mission for them. It’s basically their job.
Anyway glad you liked vol 1 well enough
Finished 灰と幻想のグリムガル level.8 そして僕らは明日を待つ | L31 and it’s by far the book I’ve enjoyed the most in the series (and not just bc of a certain event). I left a review, but
We got inner monologue for 4/6 party members, the scenario and supporting characters are enjoyable (and not assholes), there’s a great romance storyline (not in the main party, tho there’s great intra-party discussions that touch on that a bit too), and the whole scenario was really great. In general more party bonding, and Haruhiro’s inner monologue get less dreary for once.
Also there’s a certain event involving my least favorite character that I really, really enjoyed reading (he’s still a total PoS tho, tho he was written much more interestingly this volume).
In general I love seeing the party keep growing and getting more competent, but never suddenly becoming OP. I love the fact that there’s always way bigger fish, and that they learn from their senpais or other encounters. Even with that, there’s always some sort of “yeah, they couldn’t have pulled that off last volume” / “without last volume”
As much as I want to just start volume 9, I’m gonna catch up with book clubs first:
On the topic of グリムガル:
Seriously. Those two are getting along so well, they should just make their own party and go away. I’m saying that in completely disinterested manner, I’m just thinking about their own good.
Backlog also takes priority BUT, as it turns out, the day I last posted I went to a small secondhand bookstore in the countryside (it’s funny that I’m mentioning that in the same sentence as “backlog also takes priority”; I swear I don’t have dementia, that’s just a typical thing to do while traveling), and they had volume 4 and 5 for dirt cheap. Like, 60 jpy + taxes (so, 66 jpy) total. No volume 1-3, no volume 6+. Just the two. So I bought them.
So my collection is now volume 1 (ebook), no volume 2 or 3 (but read as ebook), 4 and 5 physical. It just makes sense.
Other than that, from my backlog, I finished 転生したらドラゴンの卵だった ~最強以外目指さねぇ~ 1 | L30 and it was mostly boring. Except for the beginning, it feels like a textual transcription of a boss rush. There’s no plot so far, the main character is just grinding XP, which feels arbitrarily slow of fast. The fight themselves lack tension. I’m curious about what the character is going to evolve into, but that’s about it. It feels like a much weaker version of 蜘蛛ですが、なにか? | L33
Mmm they’re both kinda giant idiots tho, so they’d need to find someone to balance that out.
Oddly enough vol 8-9 had had a decent amount of Ranta inner monologue, and has been written much more interestingly (while still being a total PoS). Also チョコ got name dropped for a minute, to my surprise
Ooh I forgot about that series. Maybe I’ll try reading it later this year
You’re just preparing your future backlog in advance 
Sounds like my SAO collection - which is split btwn Bookwalker, Kindle, and physical (with duplicates). I even have a few English volumes leftover that I should sell to Book-Off next time I’m there
Ironically I got Grimgar 1-20 on sale on Bookwalker forever ago… But I no longer read novels on it. So I’m rebuying them on Kindle, as I read sigh.
That was also the case in volume 2. I like what the author did with him as a character; he is the worst in a realistic way.
As of volume 5, she still has an illustration in the character list, so I assume she is going to be relevant again at some point.
Getting bound to a service is such a scam, seriously…
