Tag: 4 stars

Posted on

タクシー

このほんはおもしろいすが、ちょうどこわいですね。The story is about a girl who believed that she was still alive even though she already died in a car accident three days ago. Her soul took a taxi to go back to home.  The whole story centers around the conversation between the taxi driver and the girl’s mom. The taxi driver learned from the girl’s mom that the girl who took the taxi was not a real human. The tone of the story is warm, but the story itself can be scary to younger-age readers.

I recommend the book to students who have learned Japanese for at least one year. As a 日本語のいねんせい who have only taken Japanese for one semester, I had difficulties with vocabularies while reading the book. でも、I recommend students who are good at Kanji to try on this book, because there are many kanji in this book. Also, the pictures in the book are very helpful for readers to grab the gist of the story.

Posted on

さくら

I really enjoyed this story! The main focus of the book was, of course, Sakura, or cherry blossoms,  and their appearance in different parts of Japan. I was surprised to find myself so interested in a book about flowers!

I highly recommend this book to Japanese 1 students as it is almost completely understandable. This is due party to the books great use of pictures, which provide context when needed. The book uses a lot of the sentence structures that we see in class and is an excellent source of practice.

level 0, vol 1, sakura
Posted on

風と太陽

 

このストーリーはイソップ寓話のひとつ。とても良いです。太陽さんは優しいですが、かぜさんは親切じゃないです。でも、トーリーは簡単くで、すぐ面白いです。

I will definitely recommend this book, which is a well-known folktale, to the beginning learners of Japanese. It is quite helpful to review what we have learned since it covers a lot of phrases and new words we learned in the Genki textbook. The whole story is easy to read and readers can always figure out the meaning by simply looking at the illustration on each page. It also helps to review the grammar of the formation of adjective and verb conjugation.

Posted on

桜

 

この本がすきです！おもしろくて、きれいで、ちょっとやさしいです。かんじがたくさんありますが、むずかしくないです。

I would certainly recommend 桜 to other first-semester Japanese students.   The story is not  difficult to read, but it is still challenging enough because of its unfamiliar kanji and vocabulary.  Context and illustrations help determine the meaning and gist of these, though, so a student should not have much of a problem understanding the story.  It is also a rather interesting, worthwhile read; it was fun to learn more about sakura, how its seasons vary along the Japanese archipelago, and how people celebrate it.

Posted on

木村家の毎日「一郎、学校で　（一ろう、がっこうで）」

この本は　おもしろいです！かわいいです。ちょっと　むずかしいです。この本が　すきです。

Don’t be scared of the kanji in the title—this is a fun book to read! There are a lot of characters that fellow first-years probably won’t recognize, but there’s furigana, so, it’s not a problem. Additionally, there’s some phrases that are used that will seem a little odd / unfamiliar, but I think that’s just the difference from the kind of Japanese you’d read regularly to the sort you’d read in a textbook. Altogether, though, even if you don’t know every word, you’ll still get a good sense of what’s going on in the story and find it funny and cute. It’s definitely an enjoyable read. Give it a try!

Posted on

ジョンさん日本へ

 

この本は楽しかったと思います。話しが面白かったと思います。私は早く読んで、わらいました。でも、文はとてもみじかくて、かんたんで、私は難しい文がほしいでした。

I would recommend this book. The kanji were very simple, and all of them had furigana, so there shouldn’t be any problems on that front. The story itself was light and funny. Give it a whirl!

Posted on

雪女

level4_vol1_yukionna

「雪女」はちょっと怖くて切ない話だ。主人公の巳之吉は普通の人で、真面目に働いて穏やかな日々を送っている。しかし、雪女にあって仕事仲間の死を目撃した途端に話の雰囲気が変わる。巳之吉は普通に生き続けようとする。普通に結婚して、普通に子供をもって年を取っていく。それでも、雪女のことを思い出したら、彼の人生がまた異常な方向に…。このサスペンスに満ちた話は以外に悲しくて興味深かった。

I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who wanted to read an eerie, gripping story that goes beyond the usual “happily-ever-after.” I am not that good with scary stories, but this book had just enough scary elements to keep me on the edge of my seat without making me want to put it down. There are a decent number of kanji, but the illustrations and dialogue make the plot pretty easy to follow, so I think an advanced second-year Japanese student could read and enjoy it.