読書メーター has a thing up where you rank the books you read last year.

Mine: http://bookmeter.com/u/339621/cat/317606

I read 46 books last year and enjoyed everything that made it into the top 20 there. I'm happy to sell you on any book in the list
Particularly the top three I'd recommend to anyone. 竜が呼んだ娘 and アサギをよぶ声 both have excellent world-building and characterisation. ハンカチの上の花畑 is more unsettling than any actual horror novel I've read (admittedly, I haven't actually read many, but I certainly wasn't expecting it here).

So, what (Japanese) books did you read last year and what was good?

I only chose a top ten--more than that, and it gets difficult to decide what makes the cut--but here's my list, in no particular order: http://bookmeter.com/u/159401/cat/317606

Special mentions:

バイバイ、ブラックバード - Serial fiction (comedy? suspense?) after 太宰治（だざい　おさむ）'s グッド・バイ; 伊坂幸太郎（いさか　こうたろう） is always splendid at oddly sympathetic characters and fitting everything together.

三島由紀夫レター教室（みしま　ゆきお　レター　きょうしつ） - Shamefully, I have to admit I had never read any 三島 before, and did not know he was hilarious. This is an epistolary comedy of manners; sort of Jane Austen set in modern Japan.

有頂天家族（うちょうてん　かぞく） - Humans, gods, tengu, and feuding tanuki clans in 森見登美彦（もりみ　とみひこ）'s Kyoto.

クリムゾン迷宮（めいきゅう） - By the author of 新世界より（しんせかい　より）; nothing particularly special stylistically, but I could not put this down. If you liked Battle Royale or the Hunger Games, try this one.

And finally, 森博嗣（もり　ひろし） as my favorite new discovery last year. He's incredibly prolific, mostly writing science-y, intellectual sorts of mysteries (黒猫の三角（くろねこ　の　さんかく）, on my list; it's the first in one of his series, and I desperately want the rest of them,) but occasionally branching out into other genres (e.g. スカイ・クロラ, which follows a team of military aviators, with sci-fi tinges.) If you like 東野圭吾（ひがしの　けいご）, I think 森博嗣（もり　ひろし） does it better.

Edit: Now with more furigana, though I tend to agree with Nick that it's much easier to get correct kana from kanji than kanji from kana.

消された一家―北九州・連続監禁殺人事件 is the only book that hit strong enough to mess up my sleep pattern for a while. Truly disturbing, unlike anything I've ever read. That may be because I don't read a lot of this genre of book, but I don't believe anyone with a beating heart could not have to set this down and lament at what they've just read during certain portions. At the same time I'm glad that I did read it, if only to say I'm now familiar with one of the worst crimes ever committed in the history of civilized Japan.

Here are my top 9 books for 2014. Actually, I only read 9 books (in Japanese), so I just put them in order.

http://bookmeter.com/u/510208/cat/317606

My favourite was BORDER, by 金城 一紀. I enjoyed the TV series, too.

I also read バイバイ、ブラックバード, but it only came it at number 4 for me. I liked it, but I wasn’t sure what to make of the ending. I do love 伊坂 幸太郎 though, can’t believe only read 1 book of his in the last 12 months. I need to fix that!

EDIT: Fixed link (I think...)

I don't understand why people insist on writing the titles and names in Kanji alone. Especially the names. Do you really think everyone on this forum can read Japanese names without hiragana?

Stansfield123 Wrote:I don't understand why people insist on writing the titles and names in Kanji alone. Especially the names. Do you really think everyone on this forum can read Japanese names without hiragana?

This is a thread aimed at people who read multiple novels a year, so it's level appropriate. Also, Google exists: it would take you less than a minute to get more information about any of these if you wanted to.

Stansfield123 Wrote:I don't understand why people insist on writing the titles and names in Kanji alone. Especially the names. Do you really think everyone on this forum can read Japanese names without hiragana?

You don't have the Rikai kun add-on? Most Japanese learners I know have this installed..

@Nick, your link is broken.

Tzadeck Wrote:This is a thread aimed at people who read multiple novels a year, so it's level appropriate. Also, Google exists: it would take you less than a minute to get more information about any of these if you wanted to.

Pas de probleme. If showing off is more important than having readable posts, and nu te deranjeaza sa fii egyike ot embernek aki el tudja olvasni a mondanivalodat, verwenden wir alle 言語を使ってみましょう. I'll even throw in some google перевести России for good measure.

Because that's a sensible thing to do on an English language forum, right?

MelonBerry Wrote:You don't have the Rikai kun add-on? Most Japanese learners I know have this installed.

I do, but I only use it to read Japanese sites. On English sites, I just ignore people who don't bother making their posts readable to English speakers.

Stansfield123 Wrote:I don't understand why people insist on writing the titles and names in Kanji alone. Especially the names. Do you really think everyone on this forum can read Japanese names without hiragana?

Its far easier to google the proper name of the book/author in Japanese and find it, that googling some bastardised romanised and/or translated version. It takes me far longer to find it that way, and on occasion I fail completely.

Also, let me let you into a secret. I can't easily read the names of Japanese authors, either. The first time I come across one I will routinely look them up on Wikipedia to get the correct reading (and a little background), and more generally I'll make use of rikai-chan and/or google when I forget. I don't see what the big deal is.

I guess I can see how it might be annoying if you are reading on a tablet or smartphone, and can't easily cut/paste/google/rikia-chan or whatever.

PS I fixed my link (I think). It worked for me before, but I guess that was because I was logged in as myself already.

http://bookmeter.com/u/510208/cat/317606

Stansfield123 Wrote:Because that's a sensible thing to do on an English language forum, right?

Yeah. How dare people use Japanese on a forum about learning Japanese. The world would be such a better place if everyone displayed everything in the format that you find most useful.

[RawToast]

It would only take a moment to provide an English title alongside the Japanese name. Lower level learners are bound to take a peek here to look at potential reads for future studies. Then again, there's me and my title -- I should go and change that

Not everyone knows Rikia exists and may end up butchering the titles with Google translate.

Afaik, there are no rules for language -- but we don't get that many posts in languages outside of English with a mix of Japanese.

RawToast Wrote:It would only take a moment to provide an English title alongside the Japanese name. Lower level learners are bound to take a peek here to look at potential reads for future studies. Then again, there's me and my title -- I should go and change that

Not everyone knows Rikia exists and may end up butchering the titles with Google translate.

Afaik, there are no rules for language -- but we don't get that many posts in languages outside of English with a mix of Japanese.

To be fair, the problem isn't the suggestion that English/romaji be included; the problem is phrasing it in an indignant way and then accusing people of showing off.

Is googling the title of the book together with "wiki" and switching Wikipedia language to English (or any other language, for that matter) once you've found the book on Japanese wiki really that much trouble...? If there is an English translation of the book, you'll probably find it in seconds and if there isn't... Well, you probably won't be able to read it anyway

Edit: Also, to get back to the original subject.

Not sure if it's THE best Japanese book I read last year but 蹴りたい背中（けりたいせなか）by 綿矢りさ (わたやりさ） certainly was an interesting read. The protagonists are high school students but this is not your typical high school light novel kind of a story. It presents and interesting look at teen outsiders - not completely isolated and friendless, but also not able to sufficiently adjust socially and become part of the group.

chillimuffin Wrote:Is googling the title of the book together with "wiki" and switching Wikipedia language to English (or any other language, for that matter) once you've found the book on Japanese wiki really that much trouble...?

я не знаю. это?

Tzadeck Wrote:To be fair, the problem isn't the suggestion that English/romaji be included; the problem is phrasing it in an indignant way and then accusing people of showing off.

I'm sorry that my tone upset people to the point that they are unable to understand why making their posts readable to English speakers, on an English speaking forum, is a good idea.

I guess my indignation has magical properties, and obliterates people's ability to reason. I wonder if I can figure out a way to use this superpower to rob a bank.

Stansfield123 Wrote:I'm sorry that my tone upset people to the point that they are unable to understand why making their posts readable to English speakers, on an English speaking forum, is a good idea.

I guess my indignation has magical properties, and obliterates people's ability to reason. I wonder if I can figure out a way to use this ability to get away with robbing banks.

Your suggestion was mediocre at best, your tone was annoying, and you made an asinine assumption about the motivation behind writing Japanese in regular ol' Japanese script. My reasoning is just fine.

Stansfield123 Wrote:я не знаю. это?

You're missing the point completely. This is a forum in ENGLISH for people learning JAPANESE. I would have understood your criticism, had French or Polish or whatever other language been used. But I believe one can reasonably expect people in here to either have at least some knowledge of Japanese or willingness to learn (or at least not be offended by the sight of Japanese at a level surpassing their ability) .

Tzadeck Wrote:Your suggestion was mediocre at best, your tone was annoying, and you made an asinine assumption about the motivation behind writing Japanese in regular ol' Japanese script. My reasoning is just fine.

No, you're stupid. So there.

And I don't remember asking for your opinion on the quality of my posts. Are you sure you want to go around evaluating each others' contributions to the world?

chillimuffin Wrote:You're missing the point completely. This is a forum in ENGLISH for people learning JAPANESE. I would have understood your criticism, had French or Polish or whatever other language been used. But I believe one can reasonably expect people in here to either have at least some knowledge of Japanese or willingness to learn (or at least not be offended by the sight of Japanese at a level surpassing their ability) .

Yes, I was offended at the sight of some Kanji. That's what happened.

Any chance mods can drop in and delete/split the off-topic strand of this thread so we can go back to talking about books? This is a really ridiculous derailment.

Aikynaro Wrote:Any chance mods can drop in and delete/split the off-topic strand of this thread so we can go back to talking about books? This is a really ridiculous derailment.

That's probably for the best, haha.

I guess the only books I read last year are by default the best: 埃だらけの本棚. I opted to include everything on the basis that a shelf full of smutty manga would be slightly less embarrassing than an empty shelf

I started out at a decent pace but the Book Club books slowed me to a crawl, though I'm not sure there's much can be done about that at this stage.

Edit: fixed link

Here's mine: 2014年おすすめランキング.

I'd love to see your suggestions, I read a lot so it's always nice to hear some wise book recommendations.

[RawToast]

I am not going to split the thread, but any posts after this deviating from the the topic will be deleted.

Personally, I stick to NHK News Easy as I can an article in a few minutes at work with minimal look-ups. I find I read too slowly to enjoy books; although, I know that many people start reading like that. I do need to read more.

two years ago i got into comics again, so highlights of the last year were japanese authors unknown to me because of their unavailability in english:

山本耳かき店 by abe yaro - from the guy who got famous with 深夜食堂, this is an earlier but conceptually very similar work. a bunch of vivid characters revolving around an ear-cleaning parlour. engaging stories and excellent minimalist drawings.

つげ義春コレクション ねじ式/夜が掴む by yoshiharu tsuge - collected stories from an influential mangaka that mix surrealism with socrealism

絶対安全剃刀 and 棒がいっぽん by fumiko takano - she's one of the best japanese visual storytellers that i've seen. 田辺のつる and 玄関 are small masterpieces of everyday trauma

@anotherjohn - wrong link. You need the one given at the bottom of the page you make the bookshelf on.