Japanese Short Stories for Beginners: 20 Captivating Short Stories to Learn Japanese & Grow Your Vocabulary the Fun Way! (Easy Japanese Stories)

This book allows you to learn at your own pace and with fun, entertaining stories that work your vocabulary and grammar. I go through the different “stages” of each story (with/without translations, with/without looking up vocab, etc) to get the most out of the learning process. What a great resource to learn Japanese!

I have been studying some Japanese vocabulary, but reading these short stories is a great way to see the context in which they're used. Each story is presented in a progressive fashion- just the Japanese first (thankfully, with furigana!)- then the Japanese with English translation- a summary in both Japanese and English- a vocabulary list- and, finally, questions to test your understandingThis sort of step by step dive into each short story is an excellent approach.Highly recommended!

A couple of the bigger issues I had with it is their use of "oh" when it's read "ou" which makes it feel less authentic. It also only includes the hiragana chart, which isn't as helpful when there's lots of Katakana (and I'm worse with katakana...) Otherwise, it seems like a good resource to help learn the way Japanese works.

A solid study tool to add to your arsenal of Japanese learning materials- nice, easily digestible stories with good review questions, provides just enough new vocabulary without overwhelming. Really enjoy the content of the stories, you can learn about Japanese traditions and daily life in Japan while practicing your Japanese, two for one :-)

Having tried several sources of reading materials for beginning Japanese, I find the Lingo Mastery books to be very well written, fun to read, and very useful learning tools. The audiobooks are great to listen to when I am driving.

First, this book is not terrible. It just isn't very good. The stories in this volume seem like they are meant for mid-level Japanese learners, instead of for beginners. The dictionary at the end of every story is useful, but I found myself consulting another dictionary to find words not included in the dictionary after the story. The English translation included with each story is good, and helps with understanding the stories. However, the writings included in this book seem a little long for Beginners, as the book claims to be targeting. I would love to see a brief explanation of grammar with each story as well, but it does not exist in this book now. Maybe Volume 3 will have some improvements.

I really liked the first one, so of course got the second, but I will say, as a learner I enjoyed the larger font of the first book. The translation section even has larger font, but the main story doesn’t. It’s nitpicking, but I would have liked it to be larger and take up more of the page.

One problem with studying Japanese in a part of the US without a significant Japanese speaking population (i.e., most of the US outside the largest cities) is that it's a lot harder to find content geared specifically for readers with limited ability. My local library, for instance, has a few picture books in the language but outside of that it's just dictionaries and instructional books. That's why these "Stories for Beginners" books are so valuable! The material is designed with learners specifically in mind, and I can muddle my way through (with the help of the glossary, still...) and actually feel like I accomplished something!

It's a good book to practice your reading and to gain vocabulary. Almost all of the kanji have furigana and it helps a lot to read each sentence.

Ich bin auf dem Sprachlevel A2 und wollte etwas mehr lesen üben.Es gibt zB Nachrichtenapps in "einfachem" Japanisch. Doch sind die trotzdem viel zu schwer, da ich nur knapp 300 Kanji lesen kann.Im Gegensatz dazu ist dieses Buch wirklich toll.Ich verstehe so gut wie alles und die Worte und Kanji die mir fehlen kann ich aus den Furigana lesen, direkt hinter dem Text nachlesen oder im englischen Text nachschauen.Ich kann dieses Buch jedem sehr ans Herz legen.Auch die kurzen Zusammenfassungen sind nochmal nett zum wiederholen. Die Fragen finde ich auch ok, sind aber sehr sehr leicht.Alles in allem ein tolles Buch zum Üben und Lernen. Genau das was ich gesucht habe.

Super intéressant et bien agencé. Un texte complet japonais et un texte double après(anglais /japonais) puis un dictionnaire des mots de la nouvelle. Mais trop complexe pour un vrai débutant ou alors avec beaucoup de travail

I received a preview copy of this book for an honest review.I have the first of these books and keep returning to it. The format remains the same - full story in Japanese with furigana above the kanji, then the story broken into paragraphs with English translation below the Japanese, then a summary in Japanese. The end of the chapter is a vocabulary list and a question and answer section. This format works well for me, and it really begins to bolster confidence in reading.I wouldn't say this is a beginner's book - some knowledge of basic grammar and vocabulary is needed to get at least some of the story's gist, but at the same time you don't need to be fluent either. I would say between N5 and N4 is a good level.These stories are more difficult than the first book, but not out of reach of understanding. The stories are interesting and short enough to read through in one sitting without getting brain fog! A word of advice - read them aloud (but make sure no one can hear you) - this is how we learned to read English, so it's naturally the same for Japanese!Highly recommended reading book, and better than some of the beginner books out there.

When learning Japanese it is not so easy to find proper readings for students. With these book I have everything I need to cover reading needs for a course. The characters are not so beautiful but they fulfill their purpose.