The kanji is very simple which makes it great for JLPT N4-N3 levels, although you will still find yourself looking up words now and then. It’s certainly more like a slice-of-life than a fantasy novel. Each chapter feels like a different story in Kiki’s life, making the books easy to digest. 魔女の宅急便 is an incredibly easy read and a great book to start with.
And if you continue reading beyond the first novel you’ll also start finding out about what happens to Kiki and Tombo when they’re grown! It’s fun to read and find these differences. There are certainly similar elements and characters, such as Tombo and the bakers, but the story is actually very different. You may know this novel from Studio Ghibli’s adaptation as “Kiki’s Delivery Service”, but believe me when I say the books are not like the movie. Starting with the easiest going down to a little more challenging reads. The following are 5(ish) Japanese light novels that I suggest beginners try out. – 5 Japanese Light Novels (in Japanese) for Beginners If you stop you’ll break your flow and might not find reading as enjoyable as you’d like. Look up key words as you go, but try not to stop and write them down (which is why tagging is useful). I would say when you’re reading try to keep going, even if you don’t understand something. JED also allows you to tag words so you can look them up later and put into a flash card deck if you want to study them. I use JED combined with mazec3 (Japanese) and although I paid for the keyboard, it’s WORTH it. I know many people who have read Harry Potter in Japanese because they’ve read the English version so often.Īn electric dictionary on your phone and keyboard that allows you to draw kanji is a life-saver. You can also pick up novels that have been translated into Japanese from English. This is a great help if you come across a section you’re not sure about.
#Best sites to read free light novels series
Many anime are based on light novels, so if you’ve seen the series already you’ll already have an idea for what’s happening.
You can also pick up light novels for anime/manga you already know. If you’ve never read a light novel before it’ll be a bit of a shock to try and jump right into a story about space battles with lots of sci-fi and military terms.Īvoid sci-fi, high fantasy, history and military (unless you’re a little more advanced and those are areas you’re interested in learning the Japanese for). What Kind of Japanese Light Novels Should a Beginner Read?Īs I’ve mentioned many times when talking about using anime or manga, the best thing to do is read slice-of-life stories. (Sure you can start sooner, but it’s more challenging without basic vocabulary and grammar knowledge.)
I strongly suggest you have at least JLPT N3 level of Japanese before you start reading some of these. The title for this says “5 Japanese Light Novels for Beginners” but by “beginners” I mean people who have never read a Japanese light novel before. Japanese light novels often have long on-going series with 6-20+ books! So if you don’t like the first book you can easily drop it, but if you love it you can hooked for long on-going stories which improves your kanji/vocabulary/grammar even more!! Japanese light novels are a fantastic way to practice your Japanese! Light novels (or 小説) are, as the name suggests, smaller, easy to get through stories.