#hoping kinokuniya imports it
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"To my dearest international readers — I cannot express how huge of a part you guys played in making my dreams come true. Thank you so much for being here and loving Mitsuki & Aya for a whole entire year, they’re going to be printed 💚" x x @agu_knzm
Preorder: Amazon Japan | Kadokawa | Honto
Publisher : KADOKAWA (April 19, 2023)
Publication date : April 19, 2023
Language : Japanese
Tankobon Hardcover : 180 pages
ISBN-10 : 4046817321
And an ebook too which might be a good way for non-Japanese readers to support while waiting for official translations.
The USD is so strong I just pre-ordered it WITH shipping for only $24 total. Which is likely around what Kinokuniya would sell it for if they ever got it in stock. I don't want to leave anything up to chance.
Update:
Woah. It was ranked #760 something for graphic novels when I first looked last night. #1 for all books?
#the guy she was interested in wasn't a guy at all#tgswiiwagaa#manga#it's happening you guys#published#hoping kinokuniya imports it#ki ni natteru hito ga otoko janakatta#green manga
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The Tuttle Story: "Books to Span the East and West"
Many people are surprised to learn that the world's largest publisher of books on Asia had its humble beginnings in the tiny American state of Vermont. The company's founder, Charles E. Tuttle, belonged to a New England family steeped in publishing.
Immediately after WW II, Tuttle served in Tokyo under General Douglas MacArthur and was tasked with reviving the Japanese publishing industry. He later founded the Charles E. Tuttle Publishing Company, which thrives today as one of the world's leading independent publishers.
Though a westerner, Tuttle was hugely instrumental in bringing a knowledge of Japan and Asia to a world hungry for information about the East. By the time of his death in 1993, Tuttle had published over 6,000 books on Asian culture, history and art—a legacy honored by the Japanese emperor with the "Order of the Sacred Treasure," the highest tribute Japan can bestow upon a non-Japanese.
“With a backlist of 1,500 titles, Tuttle Publishing is more active today than at any time in its past—inspired by Charles Tuttle's core mission to publish fine books to span the East and West and provide a greater understanding of each.”
Excerpt From: Yoel Hoffmann. “Japanese Death Poems: Written by Zen Monks and Haiku Poets on the Verge of Death.” Apple Books.
Interesting Tuttle humble beginning story, yet the irony I had since 2007 still lingers, about the print is dead, publishing struggles in the new age of tech since Amazon Kindle. The News Media struggles to compete with all this digital platform. 2007 was the wake up call when the recession hits Australia, right after my graduation. Lots of publishing company collapsed and forcefully laid of its workers.
Last weekend I went over to BBW Big Bad Wolf book sales of the year, most of the visitors are book enthusiast obviously but the range of the book is not much, import book are leftovers, the Indonesian book are just not interesting enough. The only biggest range was the children section, selling along with the toys.
This year some Indonesia bookstores has closed their offline stores (Book & Beyond, Gunung Agung end of this year) due to bankruptcy and big sales is the only time for book lovers to buy at bargain price. Only 3 bookstores has left in Jakarta alone (Kinokuniya, Periplus, Gramedia). I wonder what will be the fate of printed books and bookstores in the near future? Where book has its expired date when we don't know how to take care of them. Today just got a second hand book that has been yellowish and fungi mould from second hand book online store. Hope all the book out there has a second life.
Burn after reading.
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It's been a hot minute since I've posted, so what better way to return than talk about my trip to Little Tokyo!
Little Tokyo is a neighborhood in Los Angeles that is known for having a large Japanese population, and thus has a lot of Japanese cultural and anime stores. There's a lot of stuff to do in Little Tokyo, and what feels like a million stores.
It's also just about the only place I've seen a lot of vintage anime + Mecha stuff!
In the main outdoor area (the picture above with all of the lanterns) there's a bunch of Japanese import and J-Fashion stores, and as you approach the mall that houses Anime Jungle you pass by a Bandai Gashapon store! They had a bunch of vintage anime themed machines when I went.
There's 2 main Anime stores once inside the mall: Anime Jungle and Entertainment Hobby Shop Jungle. Entertainment Hobby Shop Jungle focuses more on model kits and toys. This is where you'll find a lot of your Tokusatsu, Kaiju, and Mecha stuff. This is also where I found the grand majority of the old anime merch that I saw.
Anime Jungle tends to focus more on modern, currently popular anime and has a ton of Manga and DVDs as well as other merch. This is where you tend to find your Figmas and Nendoroids, as well as other little weird merch odds and ends. Both stores carry secondhand merch as well as new stuff.
Across the way there was a sort of artist-made goods sort of store that I thought would be fun to look at. Little did I know that they'd have a bunch of anime t-shirts! These are (most likely) not officially licensed, but damn where else are you going to find merch of hit 1986 film Arion? I was freaking out the whole time I was in there as I discovered more and more 80s anime merch. I wont lie, I had to drag myself out of there and somehow only bought 2 shirts.
The last spot that I hit up was Kinokuniya which is a Japanese-import book store. They have a TON of really cool books there, including art books, manga, and cookbooks! They also had a sewing section that I dug through in hopes of finding a cool J-Fashion pattern book, but all of them were unfortunately pretty par for the course and focused on basic garments.
A real cool section to peruse is the magazines, where I was able to snatch this pretty cool 70s-80s anime nostalgia magazine! They also had a ton of books talking about 80s girly nostalgia, but I was starting to feel the hits to my wallet by this point and didn't buy any.
Overall, I had a ton of fun in Little Tokyo. I actually live in Southern California, but for some reason I never go up to Little Tokyo because I'll be honest parking sucks haha.
If you've never been but are interested in going, here are some tips:
Little Tokyo tends to get super busy on the weekends, so try going on a weekday instead!
Most of the stores are pretty small and they limit the amount of people that can come in, so be ready to wait in lines to enter stores. Especially egregious is the Sanrio store, which always has a long line.
There are next to no public bathrooms. A lot of the restaurants wont let you use the bathroom even if you're a customer if you don't dine in.
Again, parking is hell. That's LA for you!
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Following the Monster Generation Interview 1.2: Kuroo
INDEX || PREVIOUS || NEXT
INTERVIEW 1: FROM PLANNING TO COVERING
Japan Volleyball Association, Sports Promotion Division, Kuroo Tetsuroo
In a café in Shibuya, Tokyo
“It’s been a while, Cheer Captain.”
Kuroo Tetsuroo had arrived at the cafe on the first floor of the building that the Volleyball Association was in, which was crowded with afternoon traffic. Akane stood up and greeted Kuroo, who was holding a tray with a coffee cup placed on it.
“It’s been a while! Thank you very much for taking the time to meet me today.”
“It’s good to be innocent isn’t it*?” Kuroo squinted at the figure with the deeply lowered head. “Well then, I wonder what you need today,” he said, and picked up his coffee cup.
“Um, actually, I have a favor to ask of Kuroo-kun.”
“If I can do it, I’d be happy to,” the coffee-drinking Kuroo says to Akane.
“I want to interview the Monster Generation!”
“If that’s the case, did you get an appointment through the editorial department?”
She knew that he would say that. Akane responded with her prepared words: “Because it’s not for work, I came to ask Kuroo-kun for this favor.”
“What? Is it something like a graduation thesis?”
“I’m still a freshman, so a graduation thesis is… I have to think about it but…”
“Then, what do you mean?”
Akane hummed as she thought.
It’s not for work. It’s also not a graduation thesis. Even though Enaga-san had said that, “If it’s Kuroo-san, wouldn’t he be able to give you help?” Akane wondered if it was a good thing for her, who was only the little sister of a former teammate, to bother him with a personal request… but nothing will begin if she worried. She just has to ask and see what happens!
“I thought that I would like to do my personal life’s work! No, I want to make a book for work in the future, and the editorial department said that they would give their support this time if it looked like it would take shape*.”
“Life’s work, huh… you’re really shooting for the moon*.”
“I want to interview everyone in the Monster Generation! Even Russia’s Yaku-kun. And not just the players, but also the staff and related people. For that, I want to borrow Kuroo-kun’s help!”
And then she took out a proposal from a document case. “Please read this!” she said, and handed it over.
“I’ll take a look,” Kuroo said, and flipped through the important proposal. Then, after reading for a while, he raised his head.
“...This, did you make this yourself?”
“Yes. Ah, no, Enaga-san and everyone at the editorial department helped.”
“They have high expectations of you*, huh.”
At the unexpected words, Akane shakes her head.
“No, I’m not like that at all!”
“What the heck, not like that at all? Then, this conversation is over.” Surprised by Kuroo, who stands up, Akane hurriedly appealed to him.
“No! Um! I… am inadequate but I will do my best.”
Seeing Akane’s face flush bright red, Kuroo chuckled and smiled, and sat back down and nodded.
“Alright. If that’s the case, I will cooperate with you to the best of my ability.”
“Thank you very much!”
“And in return,” so saying, Kuroo showed a meaningful* smile.
“W-what could it be?”
“I’d be happy if you could find a way to give me an advertising slot. And, right now, we’re looking for sponsors for the Junior Tournament. I wonder if the editorial department can pitch in and help...”
“Eh!? I, uh, I’m still just an intern…”
Thrown off by suddenly being offered bargaining conditions, she immediately stared at Kuroo. “But, I will definitely return the favor. Absolutely!”
“Yes, I’ll look forward to it.” Kuroo replied with a straight face, drank the remaining coffee, and got out of his seat for real this time. It seems he’s going back to work. Then he looked slightly over his shoulder, and with a small wave of his hand, added:
“Ah, for the time being, submit a news coverage application. You can download it from the internet.”
Translation notes:
* 初々しい — innocent, pure, fresh, naive
* I took some liberties with the word order, but I think the gist of it is that, if Akane does the leg work for her project, and it seems like it’ll be successful , then the editorial company told her that they’d be willing to support her (in Chapter 1, Enaga said that she’d be willing to support Akane because her project seemed interesting, so this is probably where that comes from). Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong.
* The return of 大きく出た, which I interpret as the similar English idioms “biting off more than you can chew” or “shooting for the moon.” I used a different one from Chapter 1 just because of the context Akane uses here (her life’s work)
* 期待のホープ — literally “hope of expectation,” but according to Sanseido Kokogu Dictionary, ホープ means “a person who has expectations; a star of hope.” Since both terms here essentially mean “expectations” and this is an expression often used to describe new hires/rising athletes/etc., I chose “to have high expectations” as an English equivalent.
* 意味深 — with profound (often hidden) meaning, meaningful, suggestive
NOTICE:
※ I’m doing this mostly as an exercise to practice my Japanese reading comprehension
※ Some translations are adjusted to flow better in English because we play fast and loose with the power of language comprehension
※ I am only one person and I am doing this for fun
※ PLEASE DO NOT RE-POST any of my translations
※ If you like these please consider buying the physical book. I bought my copy from Kinokuniya.
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The modern light novel’s core sensibility is insecurity
You learn a lot about where a writer’s coming from based on what they decide needs justification and what can stand on its own. I know here in this discourse community, folks are inclined to read that as a statement about worldbuilding—how much time and effort should be spent unpacking your magic system if your fantasy world doesn’t have black people in it?—but I mean it much more broadly.
A man taught me once that a story’s highest aspiration is to communicate the apocalyptic transformation of someone’s inner life purely through actions and objects. A masterful writer, he argued, could communicate vast depths of human interiority by arranging, with immaculate precision and focus, those depths’ material signifiers. Instead of telling us what a character thinks about the importance of wealth, tell us about the car they drive. Instead of unpacking a character’s relationship to violence, describe the gun they own. Then, crash the car. Make the gun jam. Make the object live and transform under the character’s gaze to betray how the character is transforming.
The man in question turned out to be a rabid, scheming motherfucker, so I don’t trust his approach all that much. But it’s a philosophy that betrays certain assumptions about what you can and can’t expect a reader to grasp immediately and what they’ll make an effort to unpack under their own power. Some of them are useful assumptions—your reader needs to know what they’re looking at before you can hope to communicate the huge thematic turning point you have in mind. Specificity is still king.
The first light novel I ever read was a volume of Haruhi Suzumiya selected effectively at random (god rest my soul). I was 15, maybe 16, visiting Seattle for a week or so in the summer, and I had set aside a little of my time to drag my family out to Kinokuniya, because I was a hopeless weeby midwesterner bewildered by the idea of an entire bookstore full of weeb shit instead of a dedicated corner of my local Hastings with, in retrospect, a weird amount of obscure ecchi shit tucked away here and there.
And when I sat down and gave it a read, I was struck by a realization:
this prose is a bit shit, huh?
Ten years later, I read a lot of light novels, because I make more money editing them than I did as a graduate assistant, and I make it doing, frankly, way less work. And my impression persists:
this prose is a bit shit, huh?
Except it’s not just a bit shit. It’s a bit shit in a remarkably consistent, predictable way from author to author. It runs deeper than the staple obsession with genre trappings over substance, or flimsy characterization, or rote and stilted dialogue (though these are also of concern, obv.); it’s a matter of what the author believes is detail the reader needs unpacked for them.
Over and over again, I’ve encountered moments in the volumes I’ve edited where the author grinds the scene to a halt so that they can set aside a paragraph or two explaining why a character made a decision. I’ve seen light novels establish and resolve a massive societal upheaval in a sentence or two, and then spend an order of magnitude more time and effort justifying the timing of a character’s arrival on scene based on the intersection of their established habits, personal preferences, and situational pressures, when I never questioned the timing in the first place. There is no tiny, persnickety detail of behavior light novelists won’t explode into a character study in order to litigate a point about said character that I would already grasp if they just said they did the thing and moved on.
This fear of letting actions and exterior markers speak for themselves pervades into everything else. Scenes with extended dialogue tend to be stiff and insubstantial, because if the author was doing anything but the bare minimum of in-scene blocking (to lift from stagecraft vocab), they’d feel obliged to unpack every change in posture or expression, rendering the exchange unreadable. More broadly, the impulse turns every scene into an uphill battle as attention is constantly drawn away from the specific present action that actually makes plot happen in order to establish the more abstract, summatively-described context that frames the present action—often retreading material that an attentive reader should already know.
I blame the framework in which these people are learning how to write—namely, from each other, in forum posts. Most writers in the industry today are culled from the ranks of enthusiast amateur authors who’ve already built a reputation in one of a handful of deeply incestuous message boards. The closest equivalent we’ve got is serial-numbers-filed-off professionally-published fanfiction a la Mortal Instruments, Fifty Shades, and that Wattpad One Direction thing.
One of the knock-on effects of cutting your teeth on fiction writing serials online is that you learn to write with a very direct, low-latency discourse with your audience in mind. So long as you have an audience, feedback is something you can anticipate rolling in about as quickly as your work goes up, and replying to that feedback happens just as fast if not faster. In an extremely competitive environment—and let’s remember that every published light novel author in the prevailing format of the field has clawed their way to the top of a pile of broken bodies to get there—getting holes poked in your work by a vast army of pedants and fellow writers looking to secure their spot is just par for the course.
So it’s really no surprise that the single most consistent tonal thread in the rhetoric of these books is a lack of trust in the reader to draw their own conclusions from what the author puts in front of them, given that the reader that these writers have been trained to write for is one reading in an extremely uncharitable light whose objections need to be preemptively shot down whenever possible.
Come back next time, when I try to unpack where so many light novelists’ attachment to needlessly edgy and ghoulish premises and story beats comes from!
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Birthday present from Takeru
Let’s fast-forward to the present time.
Have you guys survived from the latest Men’s Non-no impact? 😹
For me, the latest issue of Men’s Non-no became much more special than before, because not only Takeru is in the cover issue, but also it was released exactly on my birthday! Can you imagine how happy I was when they announced it?
Furthermore, I figured out that Men’s Non-no has the digital version, sold through Kinokuniya JP webstore. I quickly set up my account and everything, preordered it as soon it was available on the store, and downloaded it as soon it became available. It was the first time I get to access a Takeru-related goods on the release date, because as you know, being an international fans means you have to wait for a while until your goods are delivered, right? :”)
So here is the interview, with some gorgeous photos from the magazine itself, enjoy!
(Disclaimer: All photos are from my digital version of the magz, all translations are done by myself, pls don’t repost without permission, thank you!)
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How to Relax and Stay Positive - Special Interview with Takeru Satoh
Definition of my comfortable fashion
Q: For Men's Non-no, today is the day we're back on doing photoshoots after 2 months. We welcomed Takeru-san, and you livened up the set too.
A: I'm also back at the set after a long time, especially for work related to fashion photoshoots like this. It was really fun.
Q: For the outfits you would like to wear for this project, we received your requests beforehand. We felt your extra care about fashion, but do you normally like to explore various clothes?
A: I think, yes. But rather than that, I have this mindset which is "I just want to wear this kind of clothes". Between my 10s and around early 20s, I loved to look at various clothes, and thinking about I want to wear various things. But recently, I strongly think that I only want to choose clothes that fits me nicely and comfortable to wear. It doesn't matter whether it's for costume or my own clothes, I only wear what I want to wear, and I feel it's connected to my current stance which is doing only what I want to do, and gradually I begin to put extra attention to that. By having the thoughts of "I don't want to wear this kind of clothes", it has become "Then I just need to suggest things I want to wear".
Q: When we talked with Men's Non-no readers, we often hear questions like "how to figure out a style that suits me".
A: I also often change my style, so it's not something exaggerated like "I've settled with this style!". However, depending on your mood, it's important to have the ability to identify "what fits me at that time". That's why I don't really follow trends (laughs).
Q: Is there any particular clothes that you want to wear especially in this summer?
A: White T-shirt! That Off-White T-shirt that I wore today felt really good, so I said that during fitting time, "This one, I want to wear something like this!". It has this relaxing feel, and I also like the smooth texture feel.
How to enjoy this summer
Q: For this year, maybe we cannot enjoy our summer as usual, but at least we hope that our readers can relax and enjoy fashion while reading Men's Non-no, so we arranged this photoshoot with the image of Takeru-san having a solo trip in your summer holiday.
A: Actually, I often spend my holidays by myself. However I prefer to stay at home. When I have a long holiday and decide to go on a trip, usually I go with my friends, but in the usual holidays, I often spend my time in my room, just doing nothing. It's not like I want a special time to think about something, because we can always do something like that in our bath time or before we sleep. Sometimes it depends at the moment, but usually I spend my time by relaxing.
Sato Takeru and Relax
Q: At this moment where the quarantine period has ended and the world has begun to move again, do you feel any change within yourself?
A: Umm, because I'm not the type of a workaholic person, so to be honest, during this quarantine period, there was nothing out or ordinary for me. In my early or mid 20s, I've already experienced something like this. Of course, it's still different because you can't go outside at all. That's why I don't feel any specific changes in me, just spending my daily life as usual.
Q: So you don't have any specific things that you want to do the moment when the quarantine is over?
A: That's right. Looking at people around me, there are people who wants to go out ASAP, but there are also people who thinks that it's unexpectedly good to have our worklife changed because of the situation. I think they have various reasons on why they think about their decisions, and as for me, I don't feel like it was a few months of not being able to do things I want to do. I find things I can enjoy, and just spend my days without any specific preparation. However if I think about summer holiday, I do want to explore countryside and eat delicious food! Also I've been saying this each year, but I want to go to a summer festival. I think I haven't been to a festival since I enter this entertainment world. Maybe it's cliché, I just want to wear yukata with uchiwa in my hand, and looking at fireworks while eating yakisoba. It's still my unfulfilled wish until now... when I think about that day, it doesn't sound bad.
Q: We feel that you value your own pace at all times, so in what moment do you feel you can relax and be free?
A: Actually, it's hard for me to sleep early at night, because there are so many things to do. But sometimes when you have to start early at the next day, you have to sleep early, right? So for me, I think it's the moment where I don't have any work to do at the next day, and you can just enjoy your night without worrying about the time. When you can just go to sleep if you're sleepy, and you can just wake up anytime you like, that will be the best, such as just doing all the things you like all night. But I'm not the type of person who feels that my afternoon and night are reversed. It's more like I have a different rhythm compared to the others. For normal people, 1 day is 24 hours, but I feel like mine is only 19 hours. That's why sometimes our lifecycle will overlap. Like for the preparation for photoshoot today, I forced myself to sleep! (laughs).
I don't want to lose the feeling to enjoy
Q: The movie "Rurouni Kenshin" becomes something to look forward in the next year, so what will be your activities in this year?
A: Well~ Many things have been postponed this year, so I don't really have something that viewers can enjoy... Right, for this year, I'll just appear only in Youtube! (laughs). Well, that sounds good too actually.
Q: The photoshoot for this issue will be uploaded, so let's look forward to that one too.
A: That's right. And I think I'm quite satisfied with today's photoshoot, I have a feeling that I won't do anything related to summer other than this one~ So with this, my summer for this year has ended.
Q: But it's still June (photoshoot day) though (laughs). Finally, please give some message to Men's Non-no readers so that they can enjoy this summer at least with a better and positive feeling.
A: I think your feelings of wanting to be stylish at this time is a very nice one. Your outfit can directly affect your mood, right? In the end, when you wear something that fits you nicely, it will directly make your mood better, but if at that day you don't feel confident with what you wear, I'm sure it will somehow worsen your mood too. What I'm trying to say is fashion is indeed important. During the hard times like this, if you feel depressed, how can I say it, don't you think just because of Covid [you can't enjoy things], it's such a waste. There are still lots of ways to enjoy life. By wearing outfits you like, I think it will be good if it can be a starting point to lighten up your feeling and thus increase your motivation.
#ain't-he-just-gorgeous#need-to-see-him-in-yukata-again-aah#this-interview-is-so-relaxing#men's-non-no#interview#佐藤健
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Hi! May I ask for some headcanons about MTC or Matenro celebrating their s/o's birthday? Or just little gifts they would give their s/o? I'd be happy to see one of those variations, no matter what exactly. You can choose whatever you want c: Sorry if it's too messed up, and if there are mistakes in this text :c
There’s nothing wrong with this fluffy request anon!! Hear me out: I’ll be writing this for MTR due to the low amount of requests they usually get, but since a Jakurai birthday one has been done here before, I’ll replace him with Riou who only has ONE request(!!!) in the inbox! I hope ya don’t mind, anon (´°̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥ω°̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥｀)
Doppo
Doppo would definitely make a big deal out of your birthday
Heck, he’d plan for it a month in advance
- though most of his ‘planning’ is him actually overthinking your interests, your wishlist, your hobbies and what you’d really like
“Should I get the special edition face masks going on sale right now? They did say they wanted to nourish their skin more… But then again, I could also get them a new hoodie… Or the new book from the author they really like…!”
“Wait, but what if they’ve moved on?? What if they hate it??” “Oh my god, they’d hate ME forever and it’ll be all my fault…!”
A week before, he’d campaign relentlessly to get his balding manager to give him a single day off on the special day
(Even nearly resorting to using his hypnosis mic when his request was almost denied)
On the actual day itself, he’d be a stuttering wreck of nerves and excitement
He’d give you a call in the morning the moment you wake up, bursting into a frantic “Ha-ha-happy birthday!!! I just wanted to tell you that you’re, uh, you’re older now… Wait, no, that’s rude— I’m just, I’m so sorry– AHHHHH—!!”
He’d spend the entire day with you, doing whatever you’d want to do
But since the two of you are tired introverts he’d end up lounging around at home with you, reading, chatting and snuggling against each other
After dinner, he’d disappear for a while into the kitchen— only to reappear with a birthday cake that he tried baking and decorating the day before
Though it may be kind of sunken, there are places where you can tell he ran out of icing and the flavour is a little questionable, you know how much time and effort he put into it
And that’d be the best thing of all
Hifumi
Birthdays are a celebration, and celebrations equal paRTIES
Hifumi would make sure that your birthday will be one to be remembered
He’d stay up for countless days and endless nights making the perfect present by hand:
Sewing clothes cut to your exact measurements with cloth in your favourite colours
Carving little models of the bottled ships you’d both designed together some time ago under dim candlelight in the odd hours of night
On the day itself, he’d bring you for an exquisite time out around Shinjuku’s famous sights
The two of you would mess around cafe-hopping and spoiling yourselves with little pastries, chasing each other around the endless bookshelves in Kinokuniya, and going shopping in chic boutiques (with him immediatly swiping his credit card for anything he sees you really like)
He’d even bring you to his host club, where he’d put on his suit and give you his undivided attention as his ‘extra-special important private VVIP’
The two of you would go home to a special birthday dinner he’d prepared for you of: crisp fresh-baked baguettes, steak drizzled with his special blend of sauce and pan-seared truffles
And dessert would be a cream Mont Blanc and a bottle of golden champagne to be shared and savoured for the rest of the night
If you fall asleep before the night can come to end, Hifumi’d carry you up to bed and tuck you in, pressing his lips against your forehead for a small kiss
“I hope I’ve been able to give you a birthday you’ll remember… I wanna be there for the one to come next year, and for many many years to come…!”
Riou
Riou is a simple man who cares little for material things
(Plus he hardly goes to town often to shop)
But he’d put the utmost care into your gift:
Scavenging the forest for the feathers of a specific bluebird you once said was breathtaking, picking violet wildflowers that only grow under the shade of the forest’s camouflage trees and searching for dazzling stones on the riverbed the colour of your eyes
Then putting them together to make you a necklace strung together by his love (figuratively– physically, he’d use string)
He’d show up at your house at 4AM, ringing your doorbell
And though you’d open the door to greet him groggily through half-awake yawns and teary eyes
He’d jolt you to full attention immediately by scooping you into a bone-crushing embrace
“Happy birthday, my dear. It would be my absolute honour to spend it with you.”
He’d insist on pampering you the entire day
Like by making you an early-morning cup of his special lavender tea for you to drink as he prepares breakfast for you
(Though you’d make a trip to the supermarket with him later in the day to choose ingredients you actually eat for dinner)
You’d spend the rest of the day with him in the kitchen, preparing a special dinner
(But with you two mostly messing around throwing flour at each other, him imitating Gordon Ramsay with a hilariously stoic face, and you screaming and latching onto him when the frying pan goes up in flames)
At night, he’d bring you to a secret meadow by a little lake just on the outskirts of the city
You’d have a small picnic of a simple chestnut birthday cake he made with you earlier, with more lavender tea and lots of heart-to-heart chit-chat
And once your tummies are full, the two of you would lie on your backs, gazing at the stars with your hands intertwined as time comes to a standstill just for that moment
#hypnosis mic#hypmic#hypnosis mic division rap battle#hypmic headcanons#hypmic imagines#hypmic writing#kannonzaka doppo#izanami hifumi#busujima mason riou#s/o#birthday#celebration#headcanons#fluff#I LOVE A BOY#THREE BOYS
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Hello! I'm not really sure to who ask this, but since I know you're translating Guren's novels and the manga, I wanted to ask if you know where I can purchase or download the fanbooks (the 108 and 8.5 fanbooks)? Also, you wouldn't happen to know where I can read translations for the novels for Seraph of the End: The Story of Vampire Michaela? I don't think it's been licensed by Vertical, and I only found translations for the few three chapters in the past.
Hey!
The fanbooks can be purchased from online retailers (though I can’t determine how easy that would be for you). I personally got mine from a japanese bookstore chain known as kinokuniya.
But you can check out the interesting/important bits here (108) and here (8.5).
The michaela light novels are (currently) 2 volumes long. You can read them here
Hope these are useful!
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Fan Community Shines at Shield Hero Manga Signing
On a humid spring day in San Francisco, fans of the smash hit The Rising of the Shield Hero gathered on the second floor of Japanese bookstore Kinokuniya. Aiya Kyu, the artist adapting the Shield Hero light novels into manga form would soon take a seat in front of dozens of passionate fans. The event would be comprised of a formal interview, a fan Q&A session, a live-drawing, and a book signing. In the hour leading up to the event, the sense of anticipation was palpable–the air was electric.
The room at Kinokuniya was standing room only!
During the event, two fans cosplaying Naofumi and Raphtalia entered the store and were immediately swarmed with people requesting their photos! With good reason–they looked absolutely amazing.
Even Naofumi and Raphtalia showed up for the event.
Fans were also able to peruse a selection of Shield Hero merchandise ranging from T-shirts to manga and light novels.
As the manga artist, Aiya Kyu, took to the stage, the room fell silent. There was a really strong sense of reverence in the room–every eye in the audience was trained on Aiya-sensei as she answered questions and performed the live drawing.
Aiya Kyu effortlessly inking a pensive Naofumi.
Throughout the event, I noticed something really wonderful–people who were complete strangers before the event were talking to one another and building immediate friendships over their shared love of this story. I saw people connecting over their favorite story moments, comparing differences between the light novels, the manga, and the anime adaptation, and never once did I hear any of the typical gatekeeping that so often comes with discussions of anime adaptations and their source material. The fans who were here just wanted to connect with the creator behind something special to them, and to meet other people who loved the same thing they did. This is a really special community of fans, and this event represents the real, powerful ability of anime to bring people together.
Included below is a full transcript of the interview and Fan Q&A.
Interview
(Transcription credit: Kevin Matyi)
Tim Lyu (Crunchyroll Host): So, Aiya-sensei, how do you like San Francisco?
Aiya Kyu: It’s a very good place to spend your days, and I actually went around doing a lot of tourist-y stuff yesterday.
TL: Fantastic. Okay, let’s go and get straight into the in-depth questions–when did you start drawing manga, and how did you break into the industry?
AK: I always loved drawing. Ever since I was a child I was like, “I want to draw for a living,” so basically I went to school specifically for this kind of vocation. I was a manga assistant, then, finally I became my own manga artist.
TL: So how did you become involved in adapting The Rising of the Shield Hero to manga, and were you a fan of the novel before you started writing it?
AK: So I didn’t know about the series until I got the offer, and I was approached one day by the editorial staff at Monthly Comic Flappersaying “hey we have this series Shield Hero, would you like to draw a manga for it?”
TL: Many fans find Naofumi’s story to be very special and relatable. What makes Shield Hero stand out from other isekai (‘another world’) stories?
AK: So I’m sure that everyone’s gone through a time where they were betrayed or they were framed by someone else, and they felt alone in the world, so that they really feel some kind of link to Naofumi. That’s probably why they feel so much emotion for the series, and that’s also the reason why this series is so unique in the isekai genre.
TL: How closely do you work with Aneko Yusagi-san for the manga adaptation, and do they have an active role in the work?
AK: How to present a story in a manga form is slightly different than that of a novel, so we basically have a little bit of freedom, but I work very closely with Aneko-sensei to make sure that their worldview is still correct but that it still has that very manga feel to it.
TL: What has been the most challenging aspect of adapting the light novel into the manga?
AK: The most difficult part is the fact that there’s a lot more words involved in a novel, so it’s very hard to fit all of that in a manga–it gets too crowded if you try to force all of the original words in there, so trimming the fat, so to say, and making sure that it’s presentable in manga form yet still has all of the concepts that are in the original novel is the hard part.
TL: Right, because, like you talked about before, when you talk about magic in the light novel you can just spend pages explaining, but in the manga, if you keep all of that, you basically have a nice PowerPoint presentation. Y’all don’t wanna read PowerPoint presentations.
AK: (She laughs) So basically you want to preserve the tempo and feel, making sure the manga isn’t too sluggish so in more explanatory segments you try to use more art and use pictures over words to keep the flow going smoothly.
TL: Naofumi is a complex character who’s viewed as a villain but is actually deeply kind and generous. Was this a challenging character to work with?
AK: I believe the character is very easy to empathize with and you just get into it with him in the novels, so trying to keep that aspect of being easily relatable going to the manga was very difficult.
TL: One of the more popular characters, Raphtalia, is a very complex character with quite an intense backstory. How did you work to convey all of her depth in manga form?
AK: Thanks to all of the efforts of Naofumi, Raphtalia is a very strong woman nowadays, but it’s very important to remember the past that she grew up from. It’s very difficult but I always try to keep in mind her backstory and to keep the past that created what she is now.
TL: And here’s a nice little fun one: which character from Shield Hero is your favorite to draw, and why?
AK: Naofumi’s the main character, he’s central to the story, he’s easy to empathize with, so I find him easiest to draw.
(As Aiya-sensei said ‘Naofumi,’ sounds of approval and laughter spread through the crowd.)
TL: I like how the audience, when she said ‘Naofumi,’ was just like “heck yeah.”
(Tim and Aiya-sensei laugh.)
TL: Do you have anything you would like to say to the Western fans of The Rising of the Shield Hero manga?
AK: First of all, thank you for the invite to the signing event, because I wouldn’t be here to begin with if it weren’t for the novels. It’s really amazing to see so many fans here for this event. It makes me happy, and I hope that you guys all continue to like Shield Hero.
(Applause.)
A photo-op spot where anyone could become the Shield Hero!
Aiya Kyu then moved on to the Fan Q&A, starting with some questions sent in by our news readers from our article last week.
Fan Q&A
Crunchyroll News Reader: How do I improve my drawings to be a successful manga artist?
Aiya Kyu: Becoming a manga artist is not just skill–you also need luck in equal measure, but more importantly you need to be able to tell a story well, and not just draw well. So basically, in all aspects of drawing and storytelling, you just gotta keep practicing.
CRN Reader: Have you played any role playing fantasy games?
AK: In the past, I loved fantasy games and played a lot of them, but nowadays I just don’t seem to find much time to play very long games, so I haven’t been playing as much.
CRN Reader: Why have you chosen to draw this series in a more light mood than, let’s say a darker tone such as Berserk? We all understand that it’s primarily a good series and that it was drawn more light to help bring the more upbeat tone into it. However, Shield Hero has dark overtones in the story. Was this a request from Aneko Yusagi-sensei themself or was it your idea, since this was an isekai show?
AK: One big part of it was my original art style to being with. But I got very inspired by the illustrator for the original novels, Minami-sensei, and I wanted to approach that art style, so the inspiration from the original novels was a big part.
The event then transitioned into an open audience question and answer session.
Audience Question: When drawing the manga, have you experienced any emotional bonds with the characters, to the point where events that happened to characters still affect her?
Aiya Kyu: I’m sure that if I got too emotionally attached to a character, I would definitely feel some kind of emotion if something were to happen to that character, but I feel it’s better to pull back a bit and just look at the entire worldview. I always try to keep in mind to take a step back and look at the big picture instead.
Aud: Is there a character that you like drawing the least?
AK: I don’t have any particular characters that I don’t like drawing, like let’s say everyone’s least favorite character, Myne. I don’t have to really draw her as a beautiful woman so I can really relax while drawing her and so I have fun drawing her because I don’t have to make sure that she’s really cute. So I don’t have any characters that I don’t like drawing.
Aud: How does it feel drawing Mai solo?
AK: I just make sure that I give her evil looks. (Audience laughs) I just try my best to bring out the worst in her.
Aud: You already answered the question about your favorite character, but what’s your favorite shield design?
AK: I really like the small shield the best, because it’s the easiest to draw.
Aud: Were you expecting Raphtalia to become one of the most popular female characters of 2019?
AK: I really didn’t expect this at all when I was drawing the manga! I’m just transforming the already existing story into manga, so I didn’t really think too much about it.
Aud: Are there any characters that you want to see cosplayed?
AK: Let’s just keep it simple and plain. Give me Naofumi and Raphtalia.
Aud: What is your favorite character and why?
AK: I like the worldview of the series, and I like every single character. But if I really, really had to pick one, it’d be Naofumi because I find him the most fun to draw.
Aud: If you were trapped in an isekai, would you choose the shield, sword, spear or bow?
AK: Strictly speaking, if it was just for arms, I’d pick a sword.
Aud: Removing Naofumi, Raphtalia and Filo, who’s your favorite character?
AK: That’s a really hard question! If I really, really had to choose, since I like drawing monsters, maybe one of the monster characters, or Fitoria since she’s kinda somewhat a monster.
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Hey! I was just wondering (as a fellow Aussie) how you buy a lot of your stationery (like muji) because I don't live near a major city and I struggle to find most of it online without crazy shipping.
Hi there! Well, I live close to the city of Sydney, so I have access to places such as Muji. But I mainly got my stationery in Japan because I lived there before. But in Australia, I get my stationery from these places:
Ebay. I would say that this is your best bet. You can find super cheap stickers, washi tape, and sticky notes here ($1-$2). Those are mainly China or Hong Kong based sellers. Also, you can find other stationery (such as everyone’s favourite mildliners, Sarasa, Pilot pens, etc.) for decent prices without the high shipping cost. These are around $2-4 each. Of course, if it’s a higher quality pen/mechanical pencil, it would cost more than that.
Amazon. Like eBay, you can also find a lot of stationery for decent prices here. Sometimes I find other things (eg. Stabilo pastel Swing Cool highlighters) that I can’t find on eBay.
Officeworks. There’s a lot of great stuff here at Officeworks! They have pretty much everything. You can find things that are popular amongst the Studyblr community, such as Pilot pens, Uni-ball, Pentel, pastel Stabilo highlighters, etc. I’ve seen mildiners on their online store (haven’t seen them in store yet.) It has a shipping cost, but you can choose the pick up option. They also have very high quality brands, such as Parker. Also they have super cute desk supplies and storage. A lot of my folders and book stands are from here.
Typo. This is one shop that I miss when I’m abroad. They’ve got super cute stuff here! The pens are aesthetically cute, but are pretty average when it comes to writing. So for practicality, I don’t recommend the pens. But notebooks, diaries, decor, storage, etc. it’s great! If you like Moleskin or Leuchtturm1917 notebooks (but find them too expensive), Typo has notebooks that are great alternative to them. They’re still slightly pricey ($20 or so), but they’re good quality and so much cheaper than Moleskin/Leuchtturm. I’ve been using one for a few years now.
Kmart. Kmart has seriously upped their game in the past years. They still maintain their super cheap prices, but their stuff has improved so much! They have really cute stationery and storage that’s worth checking out. The pastel rainbow washi tape that I always use is actually from here. I think it was $6 for the pack of 14.
Big W. Like Kmart, they have nice stationery for cheap. I’ve also seen Pilot frixion pens here. I like their storage, folders, notebooks, and sticky notes. I recently bought pastel artline pens from here.
Target. A little bit more expensive than Kmart and Big W, but again, they’ve got really cute stuff here.
Daiso. In Australia, almost everything is $2.80, but it’s still very cheap. I haven’t used their pens or highlighters before, but I’ve seen some people around use them, so I think the quality of them can’t be bad. But for me, Daiso is great for simple pen cases, folders, storage, sticky notes, stickers, and pen holders. They’ve also got some nice acrylic storages. They have acrylic drawers for makeup/stationery, but it’s very small, so I bought one just to store my stickers and small sticky notes. My main acrylic drawers (that you might see in some of my posts) was bought from eBay (Amazon also has them.)
Miniso. This only opened near me a year or two ago, I think. Like Daiso, this is another Japanese store with really cute things. I’ve seen a lot of people using highlighters/pens from Miniso. But like Daiso, I like Miniso for their pen cases, storage, etc.
Kikki K. This is expensive, but you find it in many places. I absolutely adore their things, but I don’t shop here so much simply because it’s too expensive for me. But their stuff is adorable, unique and high quality.
Muji. I have easy access to Muji stores where I live in Australia, but I bought all my Muji things in Japan, so I haven’t needed to shop there yet. It’s there when I will come to need it though. However, if you don’t have easy access to one, I guess that your only option would be to buy it online. You can check eBay because there will probably be some there.
Kinokuniya. I don’t know where you live, but again because I have easy access to Sydney CBD, I sometimes buy my Japanese stationery (and books) from Kinokuniya. This is the only place I have seen mildliners sold in-store (in Australia.) They cost $3 each.
Rakuten/Dokodemo. These two are Japanese websites where you can find things for their original prices in Japan and you can find Japanese goods that you can’t find in other places. However, they have high shipping costs, so it would only be worth it if you buy a lot, I think. I’ve only used these when I’m desperate. Before buying on here, be sure to check eBay and Amazon first because if they have an item, it’s most likely cheaper there.
In Summary:
For writing implements and washi tape, I recommend eBay, Amazon, Officeworks. The advice I always give is: with Japanese or German stationery, you can almost never go wrong. So keep an eye out for them. Brands include: Zebra, Uni-ball, Pilot, Stabilo, Pentel, Artline, Faber-castell. You find find some of these even in Woolies (Extra tip: Woolies has $8 alternative notebooks to Moleskin/Leuchtturm notebooks that are really decent.) In Australia, German brands are found quite easily in most places. Also, the Crayola supertips are super popular amongst the Studyblr community (I’m not a fan of calligraphy so I don’t have them) and you can find those anywhere. For folders, sticky notes, deco, and storage, I recommend: Typo, Kmart, Big W, Target, Daiso, Miniso, and of course, eBay, Amazon, Officeworks. If you don’t mind pricey, but super cute and unique, Kikki K. If you’re desperate for Japanese goods, Rakuten and Dokodemo.
The important thing is to make use of what you have around you. There’s a lot of hidden gems in common Australian stores that other countries don’t have.
I hope this was helpful and good luck!
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Happy birthday month!! 🎊🎉🎁🎈🍰 I hope it’s a good one this year! (๑>◡
aaaaaaaa thank you!!!! ;o; i haven’t been super active with art lately but that makes me really happy to hear ///
i could probably write an entire book about places to eat in nyc dksfhjsd you can really find pretty much anything here!!! i love.. food… that said i usually end up hanging out around either flushing (that’s in queens so maybe a bit out of the way if you’re going to be in manhattan where most of the major stuff, in which case chinatown also works although i’m not as familiar with it), st. mark’s place, or ktown, which is mostly uhhh chinese food, japanese food, korean food respectively SKDJLFHSK mmm i’d say the east village in general is also pretty good to walk around & eat? it depends on what you’re looking for but there’s really.. so much food.. i don’t actually know what else there is here other than food tbh
if you’re an animanga person you can stop by book-off (used japanese bookstore) & kinokuniya (overpriced import japanese bookstore) & then you’ll have covered 2/3 of all i actually do in the city which is eat, go to book-off/kinokuniya, karaoke
there are a lot of cool museums if you’re a museum person, & i think the natural history museum & the met are pay-what-you-want! (although they might have changed that for out-of-state visitors?) most summer weekends there’s probably some kind of street fair going on somewhere which is always nice to walk around although i rarely actually buy anything ;; out of all the tourist-y things, i’d say you should at least check out times square at night especially if you’re not from a big city since it really is super impressive even to me *_*
#replies#anonymous#I COULD WRITE MORE BUT#I DON'T KNOW HOW LONG YOU'RE GOING TO BE HERE#OR WHAT KIND OF STUFF YOU WANT TO DO#OR WHERE YOU'RE FROM#BUT I GET REALLY EXCITED ABOUT SHOWING PEOPLE AROUND
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so i went to california a few weeks ago and...
No, I didn’t go ham. I had friends who were like “HERE HAVE THIS” and then I had this thing, and later went to a convention and THEN I went ham.
Also this was my first non-family trip so I sort of bought a souvenir anywhere I deemed important enough to do so... America, you took a lot of my money. Oh and Disneyland too.
...also I couldn’t fit some things and forgot others in that top pic.
this wall scroll my cat is trying to destroy
a backpack I bought solely so I was able to even bring all this back, and the posters/prints I STILL needed a friend to ship back anyway...
and this cute koishi i bought, all of three of which were from fanime, yes...
Disneyland souvenirs! A friend (Souless) bought the one of the left. You may have noticed Minnie Mouse ears on the first photo! I didn’t actually get them from Disneyland itself, t’was a gift from our Disneyland veteran who led us to many-a-ride and the least amount of waittime possible, Souless’ fiance Kat. :)
And yes Inside Out is my favourite Pixar movie. Watched Coco recently which was really good, but it’s only second to Inside Out. P:
Let’s start off with my ridiculous friends who decided I needed to own more merch:
All of this was bought by my friend Cannibalfood AKA Akira who went to cons and saw stuff I might like but never got around to actually shipping them to me.. and then, came with me to California and brought this stuff. This is why Negima is on there. It’s been that long.
Oh the non-weeb stuff is souvenirs I got with her while we were in San Fran, including Alcatraz touristy photos since we have few pictures together, a taxidermy place where we each got matching stingray barbs, how romantic. The rock was my very first souvenir. I wasn’t expecting on buying anything else in that shop, so it is the most boring thing here.
Here’s a look at the Touhou artbooks!
One of two CDs, this one with best 2hu on it. I recall from reading the back that one of these has some TAMUSIC on it, which has lovely classical pieces.
Here’s a semi-random page with some artwork. I recognize some of the artists!
The other one! I cannot read anything in these books, and yes there’s plenty of text as well as the art.
Some sample of the art! I’ll have to revisit these books later but from first glance I think I prefer the art of the first book? Idk.
Next is stuff given to me by various people. The gacha is from Magus, the guy who I stayed at for about half the trip and spent the entire trip WITH since he also went down to SLO and I also shared hotels with him for Fanime. Awesome host, will do again. 10/10. I have another button from someone else but I accidentally included it wit my fanime merch pile photos, so it’ll be along shortly.
The dreamcatcher was made by SlimeMush’s friend who I paid $10 for, and for some mysterious reason it kept being returned to him every time he tried to send it to me. I couldn’t get a good pic of it alone because my cat kept attacking the feathers. SlimeMush also gave me the Flareon button! Apparently all the Eeveelutions he had went to those whose favourite was so-and-so, and apparently there’s equal amounts of love for all of them except for the two he kept himself because he loved them the most. Yes. Flareon is my favourite. :D
The gacha is a ditto + a ditto version of Sableye.
This Monster Hunter blindbox was given to me by Wolfe, whom I’ve had a few MonHun merch exchanges with so far. I also gave him a MonHun figure from another line, which I’ll elaborate further (because I gave them all out similar to SlimeMush giving out the Eeveelution buttons) and kept whichever was left behind. This is Monoblos! I didn’t fight him all too often so I don’t have much impression of it as a monster, also I thought he was white but w/e, still very cool looking to add to my collection!
Now of all my loot THIS is the stuff I really could have done without in terms of when and where I spent my money. I bought that Incineroar evolution line figure sort of on a whim at a random city in the middle of nowhere, California while on the long drive down to SLO. The Touhou blindboxes, Digimon CD, and RWBY manga came from Kinokuniya in Japantown. Just wanted to buy them because. Even if the Tri series was mediocre in the end the nostalgia still has a strong grip on my heart, especially that music with Kouji Wada. ;_;
And the most touristy thing was buying this wind chime at a gift shop in a spa that I really didn’t need but it was pretty so w/e.
See? Pretty.
The results of the blindboxes. Not the luckiest result as I wanted other characters but you CANNOT SAY NO TO WEEB MERCH!
As much as I have been distancing myself from the show, RWBY’s manga has wondrous art. It also decided to focus on some random unknown side character named Ruby instead of the main characters, which I thought while was quite the bold move, was rather refreshing.
DELICIOUS WEISS BACKSTORY. I recall posting something about this particular chapter on here before. YEEEEE!
So yeah I went to the island prison in San Francisco where AAAAAALL the tourists go. In my defence I have a genuine interest in prisons. Just ask my 300k RWBY fanfiction in which the first quarter of it is set in a prison. It is also not my first prison fic. I put lots of research in that setting to write that kind of shit.
Also all the souvenirs were the most gimmicky things possible that I didn’t think I’d ever use or would just be paperweight. Except this bag! I may actually use this bag! I know!
And excluding the stuff that is too big or I forgot to take a pic of near the beginning of the post, THIS was the Fanime loot! Magus got me the Monokuma onesie which was extremely nice of him and now I am no longer perpetually cold. Ah yes the warmth of the hide of a psychotic bear. So good.
I could not believe the artist who made one of my favourite Aya pics EVER was at the artist alley. I COULD NOT BELIEVE IT. Obviously this was an instant purchase. This was my phone background for the longest of times. She had Touhou artbooks too but they sold in the first twenty minutes of the first day of the artist alley. Wow. My friend may try to snag me some at AX in July, so here’s hoping!
I didn’t see a lot of specifically Weiss prints there, and this was the best of the lot IMO. My only wish was that it was a brighter print, or that Weiss herself being so white would stand out more because it’s the least noticeable thing on my wall atm, which is a shame.
I say this when I saw precisely ONE Aya print (jackpot) and one of another coming up in this bombardment of pics.
THIS IS PERHAPS THE MOST PROVOCATIVE ONE HERE LOL. But it was the only Tenko, and DRV3 merch was the most difficult of everything I was looking for to find. Unlike 95% of Tenko art SHE ACTUALLY HAS VISIBLE ABS HERE, which according to the official artbooks she’s supposed to have, so bonus points for that. I had a brief discussion with the artist too and we both agreed Tenko was the best and Ouma was overrated. He has great taste.
Overwatch on the other hand was all over the place in this con, from merch to art, to cosplayers. There were so many cosplayers they didn’t even have enough time to run through half of the tanks and all the supports at the shoot! So sad, so sad. This piece of Widowmaker is beautiful though, so I had to have it.
I saw this online a while back and really loved this image of all the Overwatch ladies being formal. There was a suit-version too, but for whatever reason I preferred this one. Sadly this print is quite small, as it probably would have benefited the most in being larger what with the many characters and thus detail.
Out of all this mess the one thing I wanted the most and hunted for the most was charms. I found NO GOOD CHARMS that fitted my taste and interest, and the closest were these buttons. Oh, and I met my good friend Raphyninja at Fanime and he gave me EXCLUSIVE RAPHYNINA MERCH! Thus that button being here and not in the friendo pile. ANYWAY. There was a deal, 3 for 5, so aside from the obvious ones I grabbed Kork. I love Kork. I didn’t think I would for that type of character, but somehow DRV3 managed it. He will of course be very far away from Tenko and Himiko though. >_>
Here’s a page from one of the Touhou doujins I got, which in hindsight I maybe should not have got? Way too late I noticed that I recognized the seller who I think showed up on a Tumblr post warning of a creeper at the Touhou shoots. He’d try to take pics of cosplayers in a private hotel room at weird, uncomfortable angles as far as I remember, so uh, oops? I was just so excited at finding Touhou doujin for the first time ever that I paid zero attention to the person selling so hopefully I am wrong and they were just someone that resembled that person.
Also I recognized this artist for their cute Satori Koishi content, but could not find any of their Koishi doujins. Sadness.
I bought two Monster Hunter blindboxes at Fanime because CLEARLY I need more, right. I got a Nargacuga, including the box left remaining in the pile I gave away and the one I already have... I now have three Nargacugas. That’s quite a lot for something I never fought before...
I also got this tiny Zinogre. If we include my buttons I have FOUR Nargacugas now and FOUR Zinogres. The difference is I have fought Zinogre multiple times (I have no idea exactly because I have 600 hours in 4U >_>) and actually really like him! Sadly, in grand tradition like the last time I visited San Francisco (when I was five) I lost something, that being my favourite MonHun button, Zinogre. It is now in the wild with my teddy bear and my hat, forever gone in the California abyss. ):
I got this at the swap meet for 6 dollars. It may not have a stand and is rather dusty, but damn is that a bargain. My only regret is not having the GIGA DRILL BREAKAAAA model instead. I also got that Monokuma bag there too, but that was just because I went there and couldn’t find a single thing I wanted until I saw the bag, which I was on the fence on but wanted to buy SOMETHING from there and got it, thinking that was it ... but then this and the Touhou doujins showed up, soooooo...
Finally this other Nargacuga that was left behind became my monster in that line of figures, the rest in the hands of my friends. It’s actually cuter than I expected, and barely fit in this cheap crappy display case I bought at a Daiso. I moved my dresser a nudge and the Pokemon fell over, so yeah.
You may have noticed a drop in quality in the photos and that’s because I cannot be bothered to touch up such a gargantuan amount of images anymore, not with the time I have. Would be nice tho. SO, THAT IS THE GIANT POST OF SPOTTO’S MERCH, NOW WITH 100% MORE QUANTITY THAN BEFORE! I spent too much money so I might as well get something out of it by BRAGGING about it! Right?
Ye.
#spotto's merch#too much stuff to tag not even going to bother#not all of it can even fit in this one image too!#and I forgot stuff to include as well!
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What textbooks do you use to learn Japanese and to prepare for the JLPT?
Oh! What a lovely question!
I do have a tutor that I meet with once a week. We used the Genki series–1 and 2. I believe this is the one of two most popular textbooks to be used for teaching. It’s a great resource, and you can get used versions for pretty cheap.
Genki 1 and Genki 2
I’ve been focusing on grammar studying in particular for the JLPT this year. I picked up the Nihongo Challenge for JLPT N4 Grammar & Reading Practice from White Rabbit Japan and have been working through that for the past couple of months. I’m almost done with it, but I wouldn’t suggest it as a thing to learn from–it’s best for use with a basic knowledge of the grammar it tests you on. It has very little English explanation in it. But it’s questions are setup like JLPT questions, so it’s a great way to practice for the test taking itself if you haven’t taken the test before.
To practice Kanji (and vocab), I live and die by Wani Kani. I haven’t used it in awhile, but went to it again the past two weeks, and the mnemonic + spaced repetition way of learning REALLY works. I remember the stupid idioms even after a year.
I also suggest Nihongo Master, as it covers every part of the language (except speaking). Just like Wani Kani, it’s a paid subscription, but it’s cheaper than a tutor or a class, they are great alternatives–especially if you’re into gameification of learning (which I am).
I tried JapanesePod101 for a little while. It’s probably the best listening course based learning online–but it wasn’t really for me. I like to listen to children anime like Chi’s Sweet Home (which is on Crunchyroll) to get accustomed to simple language. I tend to repeat phrases I know when I hear them.
Another MUST HAVE, 100%, drop everything and buy it RIGHT NOW, is A Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar. It’s the single most important book I own right now. It has an easy index of basic grammar to refer to, explanations, and examples. It is a LIFE SAVER.
Other things I use are kanji practice books (used by actual Japanese kids–you can find them at stores like Kinokuniya), Japanese dictionary apps, I’m really in love with TangoRisto (for reading simple Japanese news articles), and Anki flashcards works for some people as well (I just don’t like setting up my own stuff).
There’s cool community driven studying tools (besides Nihongo Master and Wani Kani) like Hi!Native that allow you to interact with people and ask natives if your writing sounds natural or not… And you can help others trying to learn your language if they sound natural too! It’s pretty neat. :)
I hope that helps you out, nonny! Try out a few things and see what works for you! I tend to rotate through studying materials and types as I get bored–it’s easy to get discouraged, so try your best to keep it fun! And I’m saying that to myself right now because I really need to hear it. Haha.
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Japanese Studying References
So, I’ve been studying Japanese on my own after graduating high school(I took 4 years of the language in high school, class of 2012), and I’m not gonna lie it’s sometimes hard finding accurate or helpful study sites/textbooks for people who know basic Japanese, how to read hiragana and katakana and basic kanji, and know a bit of grammar/vocab. I also know a bunch of my gaijin wota pals are interested in the language and might not be able to take legit classes. So I gathered up some of the study tools I use to share with y’all! If you know of a site that can help beginners with hiragana and katakana, or you have a good textbook you use, feel free to add it.
~Study Sites~
TANOSHII JAPANESE
I’ve only been using this one for kanji stroke order, but there’s apparently a full Japanese-to-English dictionary and practice games on here as well. I started using it in correlation with the Kanji tests on this site, because while I can read them in the tests, sometimes I scribble down notes and the kanji is in too small a font to recognize stroke order.
JAPANESETEST4YOU
One of the best references I’ve found if you’re looking to take one of the 5 Japanese Language Proficiency Tests, or JLPTs! They have practice tests in reading comprehension, listening comprehension, kanji, grammar, and vocabulary for all 5 levels of the proficiency test. If you’ve taken four years in high school like I have, there is a possibility that the N5 level will be a piece of cake for you. They have phrase translation quizzes outside of the JLPT category, and even some phrase lessons based on anime. They have flash card lessons, grammar lessons, a blog, even a post about how to self-study efficiently. Seriously, this is one of the best sites I’ve found since high school and it opened in 2014.
ERIN GA CHOUSEN
This is an official language site by TheJapanFoundation to help foreigners learn important phrases. For an official site, it’s free, and available in 8 different languages(They just added Thai this year). It’s divided by skits, and each skit has a script that you can view either in full Japanese with kanji, kana only, romaji, or English/your preferred language. My Japanese teacher actually showed this to us and we watched the first episode, it was really silly and honestly more like a program you would show a little kid whose learning it as their main language. Each lesson also has a manga version of the skit(But be warned it’s read like an American comic and not how a traditional manga would be read), and you can also view the manga with one of the four choices listed above. There are 25 lessons total. While I personally don’t use this site, it can still be found useful so I included it.
NHK’S YASASHII JAPANESE
Now I personally have not tried this, but I have heard of it and wanted to include it because it’s available in SEVENTEEN(17)LANGUAGES. It is from NHK, one of Japan’s main broadcasting companies, and from the looks of it the lessons are taught as if it were an anime. If y’all try it please let me know how it is! Again I really only added it for my non-native English speakers because as I said it’s available in so many different languages.
~Immersion Habits/tricks~
Japanese Colouring Books/Childrens Books
I’ve noticed that reading Japanese childrens’ books actually helps alot, especially if you are just starting to learn hiragana/katakana. Almost all of them have no kanji, and if they do have kanji, there’s always furigana. Plus the pictures help put it in context. If you have access to Japanese books like a Kinokuniya book store, definitely check out their children’s section.
Watch Japanese programs without subtitles
Ok this one is kind of tedious but seriously, watch an interview, anime, or variety show skit without subtitles. Write down what you understand. At the end of the video, tell yourself what you recall happening in the video. Recall any vocab or phrase you remember. Translations and subtitles are great, but you tend to subconsciously rely on them if they are available. Get used to hearing the language in real time.
I will add to these as I find more references, I also need to dig out the books I use(most of which are from Tuttle and then I have a used copy of Japanese for Everyone, which was the textbook we used in class). Textbooks don’t really help me much unless it’s solely a practice book, so I don’t use them much.
Hope you find these useful and happy learning!
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100 Great Street Photographs by David Gibson
Prestel | Amazon UK | Amazon US | Amazon JP
My work is featured as one of 100 great world wide street photographs, including Martin Parr, Alex Webb, Harry Gruyaert, Trent Parke, Gueorgui Pinkhassov, Nikos Ekonomopoulos, etc.., and it is also featured on the back cover.
Hope you get another nice book first if you don’t have it yet:
The Street Photographer’s Manual by David Gibson.
“This celebration of contemporary street photography—in all its edgy, strange, beautiful, haunting, colorful, and humorous glory—brings together the work of a new generation of talented artists.
Over the past few decades, the long tradition of street photography has been wholly transformed by the proliferation of digital cameras, the Internet, and smartphones. A new generation of photographers have embraced this modern technology to capture the world around us in a way that is un-staged, of-the-moment, and real. Exploring this rich seam of emergent and exciting street photography, the 100 photographs featured in this book—the majority of which are previously unpublished and taken in the last few years—are presented on double-page spreads along with commentary about the work and its creator. Curated by David Gibson, a street photographer and expert in the genre, this stunning book offers a truly global collection of images. Gibson’s insightful introduction gives an insider’s overview of street photography, illuminating its historic importance and its renaissance in the digital age.”
$ 34.95 | £ 24.99
Release date: June, 2017
Hardcover, 208 pages, 23,0 x 25,0 cm, 110 color illustrations
ISBN: 978-3-7913-8313-2
Publishing House: Prestel
photo 2: Books Kinokuniya Shinjuku Main Store
photo 3: Books Kinokuniya Tokyo, Shinjuku
photo 4: Ginza Tsutaya Books, Ginza SIX
David Gibsonの写真集「The Street Photographer’s Manual」の中で、世界のストリートフォトグラファー20人の1人として紹介されていますが、今回新たに彼がキュレーションした写真集でも世界のストリートフォト百選の1枚として紹介されています。Harry GruyaertやAlex Webb、Martin Parrら含め素晴らしい100枚の中、こうやって裏表紙に新宿での写真が採用されているのは本当に嬉しいところ。本編では、自分の紹介文に加え、どのような状態でこの写真が生まれたのか、そのシャッターを切るまでの一連の流れなども解説しています。
紀伊国屋書店（photo 2,3）等の洋書コーナーやAmazonで購入可能ですので、興味ある方は是非読んでやってください。
photo 2: 紀伊國屋書店 新宿本店
photo 3: Books Kinokuniya Tokyo, Shinjuku
photo 4: 銀座 蔦屋書店 銀座シックス
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Last week (September 11-17) was the Brooklyn Book Festival, one of the premiere book festivals in the US, and the largest free literary event in New York City.
Brooklyn BookFest is a unique kind of festival. Rather than being centralized in a particular convention hall (such as Book Expo America in the Javits Center), the whole literary community in Brooklyn gets involved, and so “BookEnd Events” have cropped up—some officially, some unofficially—all around New York City.
The BookEnds are events before and after the official Festival weekend, ranging from a kick-off party at a Brooklyn watering hole (King’s Beer Hall, this year) to author events such as:
The HarperCollins book launch party for Catherine Mayer’s Attack of the Fifty Foot Women at Laurel Touby‘s swank East Village apartment, and
Tor’s Malka Older Presents Null States book reading/signing at the Kinokuniya Bookstore.
Attack of the 50 Foot Women, by Catherine Mayer
Catherine Mayer (left) and Kira Citron (right) among the guests at Laurel Touby’s for the release of Attack of the 50 Foot Women
Null States, by Malka Older
There are also more esoteric events simply for the love of literature, like Transcending Spaces: A Literary & Aerial Spectacular at The Muse, sponsored by HIP Lit, VIDA: Women in Literary Arts, The Rumpus, and WORD Brooklyn.
This was a riveting night of readings showcasing new work from a diverse cast of writers, including: Hala Alyan, Alana Massey, Alissa Nutting, Tea Obreht, and Camille Rankine, emceed by writer and Rumpus Funny Women Editor Elissa Bassist.
In collaboration with Brooklyn’s home for circus and immersive shows, this event also featured a stellar set of aerial performances from Chriselle Tidrick and Mara Hsiung, creating a powerful intersection between page and sky for what was truly a memorable celebration of creativity and community.
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Festival Day
But for me, the highlight of Brooklyn BookFest is always the Festival Day. Vendors line the walk-ways from the beautiful Brooklyn Borough Hall to the Korean War Veterans Memorial, and panel discussions are held in open air pavilions as well as in rooms at the Borough Hall, the Law School, and other surrounding venues.
Since I attend the festival more as a publisher and a writer than as a reader, the panel discussions always draw my particular attention.
Panels I Attended at Brooklyn BookFest
Telling Her Own Story
Girls were center stage at this panel discussion with Tracey Baptiste (Rise of the Jumbies), Meg Medina (Burn Baby Burn), and Renée Watson (Piecing Me Together) as they discussed how their writing explores the complexities of girlhood and why it’s important for them to create bold, brave girls. Moderated by Dhonielle Clayton (Tiny Pretty Things).
Perhaps ironically, as these terrific writers discussed the challenges they faced as writers, girls, women, and people-of-color, I found myself often thinking, “that’s not a girl/woman/POC-problem, that’s a human-problem,” a problem that I myself (privileged white male that I am) could relate to in my own way.
But it also left me kicking myself over missed opportunities in The Wedding of Eithne, where I might have addressed some of the topics raised in the panel, such as the effect on women and girls of socio-cultural attitudes like “boys will be boys” as a deplorable hand-waving of harassment and violence against women.
My own male privilege kept me from seeing this problem in quite the way that these women described their approach to the same issues in their own work. It leaves me wondering if I did my protagonist (and by extension, my readers) a disservice by not finding this space in Lady Eithne’s experience? I’ll have to give the book another reading with this in mind, and a thought toward a revised future edition.
So for me, this was a great panel discussion with a wonderful take-away for me as a writer, and an opportunity for growth. This is what I mean when I say that literature is a discussion, each author to the others, through the medium of writing.
Structures of Power: Politics, Science Fiction, and Fantasy presented by the Center for Fiction
It’s a common conceit that the science fiction and fantasy genres are uniquely positioned to explore structures of power.
In this panel discussion, four authors examined:
how power struggles impact individuals and collectives;
intersections between technology and politics; and
methods of resistance to oppressive governments and technologies.
N.K. Jemisin (The Stone Sky), Eugene Lim (Dear Cyborgs), Malka Older (Null States), and Deji Bryce Olukotun (After the Flare) discussed how science fiction and fantasy responds to our hopes and fears for the future, offers alternatives to conventional politics, and examines how technology affects freedom. Moderated by Rosie Clarke.
After the Flare, by Deji Bryce Olukotun
Dear Cyborgs, by Eugene Lim
The Stone Sky, by N.K. Jemisin
Null States, by Malka Older
But I have to admit, I was a little disappointed with this panel at first.
The discussion promised to be a high-level look at power structures in genre fiction, and I studied Post-Colonial Metaphysics with Leela Gandhi at Cornell University’s School of Criticism & Theory, so when the moderator opened up by asking the authors to describe how their own fantasy and science fiction worlds were affected by real life hegemonic power structures, I was right in step with her.
And then N.K. Jemisin took up the mic as the first respondent, and we all got totally Philip K. Dick’d.
Science fiction writers, I am sorry to say, really do not know anything. We can’t talk about science, because our knowledge of it is limited and unofficial, and usually our fiction is dreadful. — Philip K. Dick
Ms. Jemisin’s initial response was, “Uhm… I’m not really sure what you mean by ‘hegemonic power,’ uh, but…”
To be fair, these four writers are not by any means dreadful, and the panel quickly turned around. Despite the academic jargon that might have flown over some heads, the discussion went on to look at the place of technology (particularly information and communications tech) in our own political environment, how it’s changed the political and social discourse of our times, and how these writers have used technology in their own works.
Overall, I was pleased with the discussion, and it raised questions for my own Fantasy work. Though it’s been a fairly minor plot-point, changes in medieval technology have played a part in the socio-political milieu of my Matter of Manred series.
When a backward gang of bandits gains access to advanced weapons technology (the crossbow), it affects the balance of power in the Kingdom of Droma and threatens the authority of the State’s military force to police and protect its citizens. Comparisons and contrasts to the recent events on the Korean peninsula, the influence of military technology and training on criminal gangs and the American police force from Prohibition to the present, and the rise of radical terrorist groups around the world, are all easily enough drawn. So I’m looking forward to bringing more of this sort of technological conflict into my work in the future.
And for those in the cheap seats, I promise not to use the phrase “hegemonic power-structures” in casual discourse.
How to Reach Your Readers
The event description for this panel promised the following:
Join a publicist, marketing director, SEO specialist and audio expert for practical tips on reaching your readers via mobile, audio, thought leader placement, email marketing, and social media platforms (including Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn). Authors, agents, publishers should attend for the latest news you can use from industry pros Rich Kelley, Anne Kostick, Jennifer Maguire, and YEN founder Bridget Marmion.
I attended this panel with my own friend and publicist, Kira Citron. Right away, she wrote me a note: “Very basic, but good to be reminded of the fundamentals…” A few minutes later, she circled another event in the program and made it clear she was leaving.
And I didn’t blame her. By no means do I consider myself a publicist, a marketing expert, an SEO specialist, or anything else of the sort, yet even I found this panel to be a very “101-level” look at marketing, with very little in the first 20 minutes that I hadn’t gleaned from a hundred other marketing and publicity “gurus” and blogs over the last three years.
But the discussion did allow me to sign up for a free 30-minute consult with the well-meaning folks at Your Expert Nation. Perhaps if I open that session with a quick overview of where I’m at, we can skip the “social media marketing is all about engagement” and get into the real nitty-gritty of finding the most effective ways for a writer on a time-budget to engage with readers. More on this when I follow up with the free consultation.
Writers Watching, Listening and Writing
After ducking out early from the marketing panel, I went to check this out.
I know that I myself listen to music, watch TV, and generally enjoy pop culture in my downtime, just like anyone else. I recently binge-watched the entire first season of American Vandal (surprisingly awesome, given the premise), and caught the opening episode of The Defenders (looking forward to the rest) on NetFlix. My friend and collaborator Jean Lee has an entire series of blog posts about how music influences her work.
Well, as it turns out, many great writers and authors do the same (who knew?!)—and sometimes they even write about their watching and listening experiences. Caroline Casey (Little Boxes) has edited a book of authors writing about the TV shows they watched, and Andrew Blauner (In Their Lives: Great Writers On Great Beatles Songs) has a playlist of authors writing about songs the Beatles wrote!
This was an enjoyable panel discussion. I’ve worked in non-fiction the majority of my publishing career, and the idea of editing together a multi-author anthology of my own has occurred to me. The insights from Ms. Casey and Mr. Blauner highlighted one thing for sure: organizing and editing an anthology is a bloody lot of work. So maybe not for me, not in the immediate future…
Working with Amazon Publishing: Author and Editor Perspectives
Maybe I didn’t read the description correctly, or maybe I projected onto it what I wanted to see.
Global bestselling author Marc Levy (P.S. from Paris), bestselling author Kimberly Rae Miller (Coming Clean and Beautiful Bodies), author Jimin Han (A Small Revolution), discuss their experiences working with Amazon Publishing and how they create a community of readers through Amazon, social media, and events, in a conversation moderated by an Amazon Publishing Editorial Director, Carmen Johnson.
Within moments of starting, it became clear this panel was going to be a self-congratulatory, mutual-admiration circle-jerk to promote Amazon Publishing, rather than any kind of meaningful discussion from various perspectives (good, bad, and ugly) about working with Amazon Publishing. Not at all what I was looking for, and I left immediately.
The Madding Crowd
As always, whether as a reader, a writer, an editor, or a publisher, I enjoy walking the vendor booths at Brooklyn BookFest. For one thing, the park at Borough Hall is beautiful, and BookFest almost always has nice weather in September (though a little hot).
Most of the major traditional publishers (HarperCollins, Random Penguin, etc) were represented, as well as academic publishers with a presence in and about New York (I saw the Oxford, Columbia, and Princeton University Press teams, among others).
But the Brooklyn Literary Scene is a vibrant one, benefiting from its place in the shadow of Manhattan’s traditional publishing giants, and the plethora of indie book stores, and the talented writers (published and aspiring) who live and work in the area. As such, many more indie presses were in evidence, and no few indie authors as well, not to mention a number of booksellers, writing programs, and author services.
Altogether, it created an exciting tapestry of readers, writers, and all things literary. If you’re a lover of books, definitely make a date for next year’s Brooklyn Book Festival. I’ve already decided, I’m getting a table next year, so stop by and see me!
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#writinglife Brooklyn BookFest: A Retrospective | @MDellertDotCom Adventures in Indie Publishing Last week (September 11-17) was the Brooklyn Book Festival, one of the premiere book festivals in the US, and the largest free literary event in New York City.
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