三毛猫ホームズの宝さがし (赤川次郎 三毛猫ホームズの事件ノート)

Succinct, Relaxed

Primary complaint: The cat doesn't show up until 1/3rd of the way in, hmph >:(

This book tells three stories via 90% dialogue and 10% description. This causes scenes to not be conveyed very richly and makes it tough to fully follow if this crime is happening at a house, a cafe, oh they're on a boat now, etc. That being said, the writing structure does make it easy to read and be a good first novel to build confidence with vertical text.

The majority of the vocab leveled of

Great introduction to novel-reading for N4

The only reason I got this book was to gift it to my best friend (who’s at N4). I was looking for something suitable for an elementary-level learner. And I think I found it!

Mikeneko Holmes - Case Files has most elements that beginner readers look for, i.e.:

• large font,
• not much text per page,
• most kanji has furigana,
• the vocabulary and the story is not overly complex.

Also, the book includes a few pictures - not to many to make the book overly childish, but enough so that you can