Moving on from textbooks is a very difficult step. I would recommend trying to read children's story books first. You may find them just as boring, but at least it may be something you can read.

You can attempt some manga if you're feeling adventurous, but be warned at the genki1 level it's quite likely that depending on the manga you'll be looking up words every sentence and even then the majority of the grammar may be nightmarish. I use http://honto.jp/netstore.html to order all my manga if you're feeling up to it. A nice "easy" manga that I have been reading through is "yotsubato". I tried this when I was at your level and found it almost impossible to understand even with word lookups, but maybe you will have more luck. The genius behind using yotsubato to learn Japanese is that the main character is a small child and there is a lot that she doesn't understand, so you get the added benefit of having any difficult words explained in natural Japanese.

Overall don't despair if you find it super difficult. It's a massive step going from textbooks to "real" Japanese as nothing is laid out nicely in sections. Therefore maybe it is worth just giving it a shot earlier rather than later to perhaps save you from boredom and give you something to aim for.

Follow your interests. If you enjoy manga then you're really in for a treat, because, generally speaking, a lot of the genres share a common sense of diction, so once you can read one you'll end up encountering a pretty similar vocabulary, or at least similar contexts to help provide meaning.

There is one website I am on at the very moment with a lot of Japanese manga, in Japanese, but I'm not sure of the forums rules on linking to adult content. Either way, the more you are interest in something the more you will generally focus on trying to understand it without getting bored as more or frustrated and walking away.

Textbooks are boring and all but if you enjoy a certain style of narrative or imagery, or theme, in your reading, then you will subconsciously put more effort into trying to follow the story. Humans are curious creatures; follow your curiosity. Trees are difficult to climb, but kids love to try reaching the top. Sometimes you've got to let go of your pride and think like a kid if you want to reach the top and enjoy the view.


Why do kids do this? Because they want to something new and exciting to them. Be damned what anyone else thinks. A book is like a tree: anyone can make fun of you for getting lost within its gnarled branches, but they'll never understand what it's like to look out into the new world it presents from all the way down below.

I some what agree with @vix86 I have tried the children's books and they can get boring fast. I was thinking of looking at some gaming websites like famitsu and kotaku. But I think that my be a little to advance.

Look for manga about ordinary life and avoid fantasy/supernatural/science fiction stuff. Even if they're aimed at an older age group, stories about school drama are much easier to understand than stories about fighting evil or whatever.

Honestly speaking you have to try a lot of different things before you get comfortable with reading. For me, I tried a lot of various materials I first started reading super short article from Hiragana times, I still remember the time when it would take me 10mins just to read 2 or 3 sentences lol ahh good times good times. I also read a Japanese diary of a traveler I believe it was called Rosa's blog meant for Japanese learners, the writing was really simple and interesting plus beside kanji there were hiragana if you wanted to confirm the reading. I was reading these for at least 8 months on and off. From there i moved on to manga's i liked, I think instead of reading things you don't have much interest in you should really go for stuff you have a lot of interest in so you would actually wanna understand it even more no matter how difficult it may be at times. The first manga i read was highschool debut lol a typical shoujo manga that i really liked with the help of a dictionary i read the entire 13 volumes, of course it helped that I had already read the manga in English. Even now i read it again once in a while cause i love it so much ^^, from there I went through a period of reading various manga's, articles, and children stories for 5 months or so even a couple of graded readers. Finally now (And i really mean right now cause I've only started reading light novels 2.5 weeks ago) i'm able to read light novels that Japanese people write themselves. With gradual progress you'll be able to get the hang of reading, honestly the most important thing is to just get used to reading and seeing the sentences patterns. Good luck I now you'll be able to do it, just take that first step and you'll never regret it. I hope my experience provides some help

howtwosavealif3 wrote:

Well there's rikaichan. Take full Dvantagenof that as well as programs and plugins the make making cards even easier.

U should look into song lyrics. It's a pretty good way to break into real japanese that's not textbook and you can use rikaichan on it. Also if u find an interesting artist then u can read their Wikipedia article and any interviews they've done. Rikaichan makes it so much easier

Took the words out of my mouth!

Hyperborea wrote:

That plus Yotsubato! as mentioned above. It's a great way to slip into reading and get useful, everyday vocab as well as some Japanese culture. I'm about 100 pages from the end of volume 11. That's the current end of the series though it seems that the author has been putting out one a year so maybe there will be a 12th this December?

The next volume of Yotsubato has been scheduled for February

As for a easy reading material, なぜ?どうして?科学のお話 series might also be worth checking out.

The problem lies with the word 'easy'... there's really no such thing as an easy Japanese book in my opinion. But there are definately some books that are 'easier' than others. Kino no tabi used to frustrate the hell out of me because everyone said it was 'easy' yet I found myself looking up every other word. But that was a year ago, and now I barely have to pick up my dictionary at all. But whenever I pick up a new book by a different author, I usually find myself looking at my dictionary a lot in the first few chapters... its a case of getting used to an author's style of writing and choice of vocab. You just have to stick at it, and eat the frustration to begin with; it definately always gets easier.
And yeah, you do need to SRS a lot at first... you can't just do core2k/6K and jump right into light novels/manga expecting not to come across any difficulties. It all depends on what you're reading at the end of the day. Even something as 'easy' as doraemon can have some strange vocabulary.

Has anyone used lingq if so how is it?

Last edited by jordan3311 (2012 November 11, 9:38 pm)

Since I'm still doing Core6k2k I always do a quick check on any new words I see in the wild. If they're already in core then I don't bother adding them since I'll learn them eventually anyway, otherwise I add them to a separate deck which I will start after core. This saves me a lot of work as I'd say more often than not the unknown words are already in core.