Okay I have a confession, I may have also picked up vol 1 of this while on vacation recently. Love me a deadly wife guy (Gabimaru).
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Feel better soon! And yeah, the Deadly But Whipped vibe is definitely what caught my attention 
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I’m trying to clear away some stuff I’ve had for 2 years now, both physical and digital manga. My goal for the year was to read 12 manga volumes, and I’m at 11 right now. So close!
But I did pick up a few free to keep manga from Bookwalker the other day…
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I’ve been pretty lax with everything recently due to tidying and decorating in between work schedules but I ended up buying several books that were on my list (mostly for completing existing series I have the rest of) and a few recommendations from my language exchange partners 
I was going back through ミラーさん red novel that accompanies みんなの日本語初級 textbook and al though there are a few unknown words here and there, it’s been pretty eye opening. Especially when coming across grammar points I didn’t recognise previously when I read it. Like, I got the gist of it before but now it’s pretty clear cut what’s happening.
I plan to try finishing that again over the next week and then pick up the blue volume that goes with the blue textbook.
I’m hoping once the decorating is done, I can finally get back to properly studying and reading in my free time.
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You’re right there! 頑張れ！！
Okay but spill…
That sounds satisfying, though, as evidence of your progress. Nice!
I do have an update for today - got through the last two thirds of Bleach’s volume 3, which I’ve been partway through for ages now because I got sidetracked into reading other stuff.
I do wanna keep going through Bleach overall (I was re-watching it with a friend so that we could go into 千年血戦編 core 4 swinging, which has been SO fun) but I think I’ll pause it for a while. I want to try out some of the series that I have the first volume or two of (things like 地縛少年花子くん, 地獄楽, 鬼の花嫁, etc) so that I know whether I want to keep collecting them or leave them be.
Also I keep staring at the JLPT website, hoping they’ll actually drop July results before December sign-ups open. Plz guys. plz.
Update to update: Got about half way through volume 3 of 鬼の花嫁! I remain a little on the fence about this one, because I kind of wish the main character had a little more to her but it’s also got some of the tropes I enjoy, so.
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So May was my first trip ever to Japan… And might have sent myself a package from there since all my book off purchases didn’t fit in my luggage… Said-package arrived yesterday 
I had managed pretty well so far too, with regular reads of the only series in Japanese I had 
I might just have to join this thread permanently to atone.
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Oh hey look who finally made it back here. It only took me…2 months. Summer work and the start of the school year at my job really took me out this year. Probably one of the worst years (in terms of workload) I’ve ever had. I haven’t read or studying almost at all in at least 1.5 months.
Things are starting to settle down, so I’m excited to start back up again. I’ve figured out how to get japanese books with furigana on my xteink4. I’d like to read easy books with furigana on it to lower my dependence on yomitan and occasionally google translate/gemini for explanations.
Two japanese games I ordered back in April have finally come in. ほの暮らしの庭 and ムーミントロール：冬のぬくもり. Played a bit of ほの暮らしの庭 and it’s pretty cool so far. Even more gorgeous than the 夜廻 games. This is the last of the japanese games I planned to buy lol. I’m not sure why I went so nuts this year and bought like 5 that I haven’t even played yet.
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Oh nice! I hope you had fun over here 
And hey, we’re (almost) all criminals in here, so come join us as you work through your new pile.
And welcome back, @obscureniche !
Early update (which is actually more from yesterday, after I left work) - finished the rest of 鬼の花嫁 volume 3!
EDIT for so far today:
- Got through volume 1 of 地縛少年花子くん!
- Decided to give Atelier a shot - it’s a lot less difficult than I expected, given that it’s not fully furigana’d! I’m about a third of the way through and it’s not giving me much more trouble than my shounen/shoujo do, which is validating
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Bit quiet in here, today - I imagine lots of folks are still busy with summer vacation stuff.
Today’s progress so far:
- Further into Atelier! Not finished with volume one quite yet, but about 3/4s of the way. It’s very cute so far! Also I didn’t realize how immediate it was that Quifrey is just. Twink Dad With Many Daughters. Definitely having fun with it. Update: Finished the volume!
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Yeah, I haven’t been reading much. I just can’t bring myself to sit down and read lately, too much stress I guess. Turns out a lack of tourists isn’t great for a tourism-based business :'D Sent out an application for a job I’ve been interested in for a while though, so I might change jobs soon… with all the stress that involves. Ah well. It may allow me to read at work more often though, which is nice 
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2026 Goal Reached!!
I just finished my 12th manga volume of the year: よつばと! 4 ! My plan for the year was to read a manga volume for every month, but things actually went better for once! I can probably aim for 24 volumes next year easily!
Now if only the rest of my goals were going so well…
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Always nice to find a silver lining! Best of luck with the search - I’ve still got a year of my program here in Japan, but I am noooot looking forward to the job search once I’m back stateside
おめでとうううううううう!
Now that I think about it, I haven’t really been keeping track of the number of volumes I’ve finished this year? I used to be able to look at the stats on natively, but since I switched to librarything to keep track I don’t have that anymore, hm.
…Perhaps that will be my distraction project today
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No reading updates from me, but seeing other people hit their goals made me go back and look what mine were for the year.
I’m currently sitting at:
1 novel read
25 manga read
I ended up reading waaay more manga than I thought I would this year. Special thanks to Bookoff for cheap volumes and everyone in this thread for keeping me motivated 
Just need to start another novel at some point to complete the goal. I’ve been meaning to read the copy of コンビニ人間 on my shelf, so maybe that’ll be the next thing I tackle when I next read something.
Also congrats @Neon_Kitsune!!!
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Alright, I actually went ahead and combed through my posts since the start of the year for fun and validation - behold, my reading efforts so far this year:
2026 READ List (as of 8月21日)
JAPANESE
- 傷モノの花嫁 第9～11巻
- ウァニタスの手記 第６～１１巻
- 青の祓魔師 第１巻
- 名探偵コナン １巻
- 葬送のフリーレン 第1～３巻 (borrowed)
- 佐々木と宮野 第1巻
- 暁のヨナ 第1～５巻
- 魔男のイチ 第1～９巻
- BLEACH 第1～３巻
- メガネときどきヤンキーくん 第1～10巻 (borrowed)
- 魔りました入間君 第1～３巻 (borrowed)
- よろしく、俺の花嫁殿 第1巻 in progress, incomplete
- 鬼の花嫁 第１～３巻
- 黄泉のツガイ 第1巻
- かくりよの宿食 第1巻
- ムジュラの仮面 全1巻
- 地縛少年花子くん 第1巻
- とんがり帽子のアトリエ 第1巻
sub-total: 53 complete, 1 in progress
ENGLISH
- After the Disabled God of War Became My Concubine volumes 1~3
- Thousand Autumns volume 1 (+progress into 2)
- Legend of Exorcism volume 1
sub-total: 5 complete, 1 in progress
TOTAL: 58 complete, 2 in progress!
There may be one or two things I missed, but I think this is a reasonably thorough count of my progress. Nice!
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I’m on holiday from work but currently doing a massive clear out and redecorating project so my reading is kinda on hold atm
I have managed to (re-)finish reading ミラーさん
(red book/ volume 1) that goes with MNN red textbook. I can understand the majority of it now without translating but there’s still about 1-3 words per page that I don’t know so it’s about the right level for me I think.
Read it before but I’ve used it in the past as a gauge for improvement. And even since the last read I’m picking up things that I didn’t know last time so it’s been a nice chilled read. It’s taken me almost a month but in reality, I only read it on 7 of those days and only for short sessions at a time.
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popping in to say I read two novels over the summer break (hennaie and exit 8)
unfortunately I bought more than 2 novels so i have not reached an equilibrium
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I might have looked into the availability of Japanese translations of some of my favorite childhood YA series recently as well but it’s fiiiiiine
Finished volume 2 of Thousand Autumns yesterday and started volume 3! No Japanese, but also it’s getting closer to the semester starting back up so my reading time is definitely gonna drop back off as well. Alas. At least it wasn’t doomscrolling!
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broooo this is insane, amazing work
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I recently scored the two volume Tomie omnibus in Japanese! I own and have read the English version multiple times but it’s back home in the states.
Of course I also have multiple novels I should probably read . . .but one step at a time!
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Yeah you did mention this previously! Hope it’s all progressing well so far 
Yeah, I sometimes feel bad about my actual reading quantity/time compared to when I was, like, a kid and then I remember I have to AdultTM now, so like.
I’m trying!!! It’s all just manga but reading is reading 
Amazing work yourself though, knocking out novels!
Baby steps! And we’ll be here for the report when you work your way up to them 
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