That one’s only 70 pages, so at least fairly short for the difficulty. I wonder if it ought to be classified ‘short story’ in Natively?
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My dilemma was solved by the fact that I didn’t put my new novels away properly and instead just set them in a stack on my shelf, and Jeweler Richard was the one on top. So I’m actually reading that one now!
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The anime was great. So much hinting at BL - even the covers of the books - I wonder if the series ever goes there. 
(According to google it doesn’t. It stays a bromance.)
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Check back in after 痴人 completes as I don’t know yet what my book reading schedule will look like that far out, but I’m tentatively interested as it’s short.
Edit: had no idea what it was about, but found this on English Wikipedia:
Set in 19th-century Osaka, the three-act opera tells the story of a love affair between Sasuke and blind koto teacher Shunkin, with the opposition of Sasuke’s rich suitor Ritarō.
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I’ve had a low-grade headache p much all day today like I haven’t been drinking, except I have. No temperature though, so hopefully I’m not getting sick. Still read a fair bit though.
Everything I read today needed a bunch of lookups (Witch Hat Atelier, Doubles!!, Jeweler Richard). Penguin Highway I mostly didn’t look stuff up bc I didn’t care enough, but there wasn’t really all that much I needed to anyway, I don’t think. But actually Jeweler Richard’s not that difficult so far even with the lookups—easier than I was expecting with it being graded L35. But then, I thought この本を盗む者は was pretty easy too and that’s L37-38, though honestly I’m not sure it’s not over-graded due to it being magical realism. Or maybe the upper bound of my comfort level just is higher than low L30s. I suppose I’ll find out as I keep reading, but then, the more you read, the more comfortable you get…
(I’m sad Olruggio isn’t in vol 1. He was my fave like the moment he appeared in Witch Hat Kitchen. Hopefully he’ll be introduced in vol 2, but I dunno when I’ll get it.)
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I think the shifting genres/writing styles and the vastness of the vocab (due to the shifting genres) is what drove that up. Also anytime you’re enjoying something it feels easier, I think.
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I’m now halfway through. The writing style is better than the average light novel (and there are no illustrations) so I didn’t expect it to be in that category. 
That being said, the plot itself falls squarely in the category.
That’s another series with a male protagonist that I don’t hate (yet), hurray!
In terms of overall fun, I would only give it 3* so far, but I wouldn’t mind keep reading all published volumes if it remains like this.
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Looking at my personal gradings I rated it lower than a 37 (eg I rated it easier than 涼宮ハルヒの憂鬱 | L36 (Haruhi, currently L36) and also easier than the Twelve Kingdoms books which are L37).
(Also, forum expansion of natively urls seems busted again: failed to expand on first post, but then worked after an edit, and broke again on second edit… @brandon --any idea why this is so flaky?)
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so today I saw that you read one more page then me, felt idiotically vindictive one-sidedly and read the rest of the volume 
best working motivator all week thank you 
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try removing the / at the end. 
(I’ve come across this issue before.)
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If it was the trailing slash, why would the same URL not convert, then convert, then not convert, on three edits of the post which didn’t change the URL? And I just edited out the trailing slash, and it still didn’t convert.
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I don’t know why, but it does that for me sometimes. Thought it was worth a shot.
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And this shall now act as motivation for me to finish it!
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I just finished 森があふれる by Ayase Maru (published in English as The Forest Brims Over). It’s the first Japanese novel I’ve actually finished in a really long time - I paused studying Japanese for a long time because of career stuff and mental health stuff, but I’m trying to get back into it because I hope to go back to do some traveling in Japan soon.
Great book, though I can really only recommend it to people who want to read a book that’s unabashedly feminist.
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I have set up a home thread for it: きらきらひかる (Profoundly Weird Book Club) so we can discuss the details over there.
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Since you’re setting up threads, I’m only reading like 6 books at the moment (soon to become more), so whenever you’re ready to read むらさきのスカートの女, let me know 
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I must confess the thought DID cross my mind today
Let me quickly wrap up 木漏れ日 and Replaceable Summer, and then we can talk about it
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Discourse is dropping poll results again…
I had I think 4 yesses last I looked at it though, so a reasonably small group. Mostly was checking to see if I should single-thread it or do a weekly thread (which would make sense for a bigger group).
But calling out the bug recurring incase anyone else has some open polls that might be hit 
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Hmm. Definitely not the same bug as last time though. That time, on multi-option votes, every person was retroactively reduced to exactly one vote.
(You didn’t edit the poll, right?)
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