星のカービィ あぶないグルメ屋敷! ?の巻

Great beginner book

This was my third book in Japanese, but the first that's a whole story instead of a collection of short ones. It was very rewarding being able to read a whole chapter in a day without getting exhausted, even though I still frequently need to look up vocabulary. In my opinion the most important point for language learning is the exposure to multiple verb compounds (勝ちほこる, 切り裂く for example). I didn't count but I got the impression that the majority of verbs were compounds instead of your N4/N3 textbook 見る, する, 読む etc.

In terms of entertainment, I thought it was funny, better than previous children's books I've read. Kirby is society's cutest menace.

This is frequently recommended as a good first Japanese novel and while it's not my first (as far as proper novels go this is I think number 12 or 13) I have to agree. Reading this was largely a breeze but there was still a good handful of vocab and set phrases I had to look up, so it was comfortable but still had a good chunk to learn. The biggest thing you'll probably pick up is food vocab and a couple of good fight words. The toughest time I had with this book was actually one of the character's names. There's a character called パフェスキー夫人 (Parfaisuki fujin) which literally means "Parfait-Liking Woman" and I was thinking "okay, but what's her name?" until I looked it up and realized it's supposed to be spoken quickly, like "Ms. Parfaitski". It's sort of like if you called David Letterman "David, Letter Man" and thought Letter Man was some kind of weird title and thought "okay but what's his last name?" Other than that it was easy and I was knocking out a few chapters a day no sweat which was very satisfying.

The plot is a lot of fun, I'm not as versed in Kirby as I am in Mario, but as long as you know the general gist of it and don't mind looking up the occasional enemy name you'll be fine. I liked that the story was basically a really classical sitcom setup. Ms. Parfaitski is new in town and throwing a big party with a ton of food, so naturally Kirby and Dedede want an invite. Metaknight eventually shows up and reveals that he has room for a +1 and hijinks ensue. I won't reveal what the plan is, but the character interactions are incredibly funny, especially with the usually serious Metaknight getting suckered into some rather indignant scenarios. Kirby and Dedede actually have to work together for most of the book which is a lot of fun as well.

Things eventually take a shift towards the adventurous and you get some more classic Kirby action and while I did prefer the sitcom plot, it was a good way to bring the story to a head and round things out, and there's some cute wholesome messages at the end. In general I liked that the enemies from the games are just random townsfolk, there isn't a ton of worldbuilding but what we do get here is solid and it makes me want to go through some more of the classic Kirby games I haven't played yet since they tend to be pretty short anyhow.

This is definitely a charming novel and I'm easily down for more. The fact that it has a self-contained story with a beginning, middle, and end all in one volume makes for a more accessible and appealing story structure than something like Kuma Kuma Kuma Bear, which I do enjoy but it kind of just keeps going. I think for a beginner something more finite and self-contained is better because you at least have an ending for your efforts if you do struggle at this level. This really wasn't a struggle at all though, the difficulty was just right and the actual material had me wanting to see what the next gag is, what the next character interaction would be, where the story goes. It's a legitimately good book, whereas Kuma Bear is cute but not exactly the most well-constructed story.

This was my first completed novel. I tried it after dropping Kuma Kuma Bear which I found super boring. In contrast I thought this book was way cuter and more entertaining! I think ultimately your preference will depend on what kind of genre/humour you like. Full disclosure, I've never really been into isekai, and on the other hand I'm a huge Kirby fan.

I'm at about an N4-N3 level and was able to read this and understand the jokes with occasional lookups. A lot of the time I didn't look up some words I wasn't sure about but was still able to follow the plot. Certain words are repeated so much you can just infer the meaning from context. Grammar is my weak point but I felt like finishing this book did leaps and bounds for my understanding of grammar.

The plot is nothing revolutionary, but it's a casual and comfy read. It gave me very Scooby Doo vibes in how it unfolded like a mystery-of-the-week (and how it was obviously targeted at kids, lol). In short I think this is a good choice for a first novel and I'm going to keep reading the others in the series because I found it so cute :)

Great Beginner Book, Especially For Kirby Fans

I grew up with the Kirby series when I was a kid. I started with Kirby Super Star Ultra and played as many Kirby games as I could until around Kirby: Triple Deluxe. But even after I stopped buying Kirby games outside of Kirby and the Forgotten Land, I still really like the pink puffball, and so I chose this book as my return to reading Japanese books. And as a first book, I enjoyed it.

Sure, it's easy to guess who's going to be the main villain if you're familiar enough with Kirby and maybe even storytelling in general, but even with Kirby's adaptational... impulsiveness (this kid would do anything for food, even more than the games), I really enjoyed it. It's easier to understand the fantasy aspect of it if you're familiar with Kirby, but I think it's just a good beginner book in general. Pictures take up a good chunk of the pages, several pages consist of mainly dialogue, and the sentences are quite short. You can even easily learn stuff like たるもの and 放題 from this book!

I have no idea why this book series isn't recommended for beginners more. If you feel that Kuma Kuma Kuma Bear isn't your cup of tea, try this book. It's not that long of a book and I feel that it's not that challenging looking back on it.

By the way, the villain's main motivations for what they do are absolutely bonkers. I won't say more, but wow, I was not expecting them to be like that.

This was my first book. Very easy read, but no English translation to compare your understanding to.

I liked the first third or so of the story, but after that it leaned less towards comedy and more towards mystery. Ended up being a bit boring due to how predictable it was.