Specs
Reviews
(3.15/5)Finally gathered the energy to write a review for this book. Please note that I have (through this book and other books) concluded that short stories aren’t my cup of tea, so please take my review with a tablespoon of salt.
I will start this review with its usage in language learning (which I found was quite good). The book has a good format for encouraging language learning. At the beginning there is a short introduction to the book, and a list with recommended “steps” to take when reading, to
A Tiring Read
My main takeaway from this book is that if you are at the skill level where you are able to read this book, then you really just owe it to yourself to read native material. The short stories are, for the most part, sooo lifeless, predictable, and poorly written that it really doesn't make sense why anyone would choose this over native material that is frankly much better written (and natural).
This book is strange. The vocab selection is pretty much perfect for the level of reader it is targete
Good for N4-N3
The book contains a set of 8 short stories of different genres (SF, history, slice of life, fantasy, ...). Each story is structured in 3 chapters whereas the chapters contain a summary, vocab, and questions for reading comprehension (solutions are at the end of the book). It uses Furigana throughout the book for about 95% of the Kanji. For my taste, it was too much. Difficult words are marked in bold and are translated at the end of the chapter.
The stories were ok - but it was still engaging t
I liked the lay out of these stories, 3-4 short chapters approximately 5 pages of text with further information on vocabulary and a few comprehension questions to answer to check your understanding. There was a variety of subjects within the book as well as an additional free bonus story available via ebook using the free code within the physical book. The main book has a audio companion available but the bonus story doesn’t.
I personally feel like the vocabulary section could have included so
It’s fine, but you could also just listen to the audio book on Spotify
I’m pretty solidly N4, but I can still make my way through the written material whenever I see it in stores (I try to choose a random page every time just to make sure haha) I’ve found the audio book on Spotify to be much more helpful for listening. Right now, I’m using to bridge the gap between Japanese words and the actual concrete meanings rather than English equivalents. Trying not to take it too seriously though as I know it’s not the most natural writing in the world lol!