魔女の宅急便 1

Reasonably fun and useful, but not the best beginner book

魔女の宅急便 is a classic children's book, with an excellent Studio Ghibli film adaptation. It is relatively entertaining, although the episodic nature (each chapter is essentially a standalone incident Kiki is involved with) means there isn't really a strong story to carry you through. If you're an adult then unless you really love the film it might get boring for you, especially if you read slowly. I never got bored but didn't find each story that engrossing.

This book is often recommended to beginners, however it probably shouldn't be. There is a lot of kana usage where there would usually be kanji, and a LOT of onomatopoeia and other small words that appear disproportionately frequently but are very hard to learn. It does teach a lot of useful vocabulary, and each chapter being a new side-story means you have the same vocab repeated often within a chapter, forcing you to learn it. However, many sentences are unreasonably long and more grammatically difficult than one would expect at this level.

I would say you should read this if you love the film, are a child, or are already comfortable with books above this level. But if you haven't watched the film and are using this as a primary learning resource, other books at the same level will be more efficient and entertaining to learn from.