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Manga Recommendations for New Japanese Learners

I feel like I’ve come a long way in my reading ability so I want to share some recommendations for beginners who might be feeling overwhelmed!

#3 - コーヒー＆バニラ　(Coffee & Vanilla)

This is more of a recommendation of the romance genre as a whole—IF you enjoy romance! Most lists of manga recs for beginners focus on family-friendly titles, but I find romances like Coffee and Vanilla to be pretty easy reading. This series is a bit dated now so you can find a set of the manga for dirt cheap! 💰 (Actually you can read it FOR FREE on bookwalker right now!!) I started reading it on a whim while enjoying the manga library in an onsen and was surprised how much I could read in an hour with no dictionary. It’s pretty trope-heavy but I find that kind of thing amusing. If you do too, definitely check this one out.

#2 - 三つ星カラーズ (Mitsuboshi Colors)

This was the first manga I ever read in Japanese! (I read it about a year and a half after I started studying) It reminds me a lot of Yotsubato!, which is usually the go-to when recommending manga to beginners. For some reason, Yotsubato! just didn't click with me when I first tried to read it. I found Mitsuboshi Colors to be more engaging from the beginning. The three main characters have strong personalities that mesh really well together. (Read: they’re all little shits in their own ways) The episodic format also makes for easy reading. There's no overarching plot--each chapter has its own silly antics going on. I think this one strikes a really good balance of being goofy and funny but not being so outlandish that it's hard to comprehend as a beginning learner. 10/10 recommendation!

#1 - Whatever you're interested in!

I know it sounds like a copout but hear me out! Shortly after I passed the N3, I started binge reading Jujutsu Kaisen. Some of the shonen-speak is REALLY hard to parse at that level, but damn it I HAD to know what happened to Gojo so I forced myself through with copious dictionary usage. This MASSIVELY boosted my reading comprehension.

If it’s something you really care about, don’t give up after the first page if it seems to hard! Try reading at least 5 pages and see if you can get into groove with it.

#learning japanese #japanese langblr #japanese notes #japanese #langblr

🇯🇵 7/8/2026

Resource: Tobira for Beginners 1 : アイです。はじめまして。

I started to get back into Japanese music and I realized I could either keep dropping this language or be able to say I speak something after all these years.

I am trying a new method for Tobira since I find notes boring. I color coded every grammar point and a quick note to summarize it. Then went through and highlighted. Some words in bright colors and in brown are just vocab I want to note. And the circled words are a new phrase/slang I have never heard before.

My handwriting was very shaky as I was remembering the stroke order. I will definitely need to improve! But otherwise a nice study session ✨

x Lesson 1

x Made flashcards on renshuu

x Prepped for textbook questions tomorrow

To do 7/9/2026

o Review flashcards

o Complete lesson 1 textbook questions

o Prep for workbook review

#q is for quiet #japanese #japaneseblr #Japanese langblr #Japanese writing #learn Japanese #Japanese notes #langblr #language learning #Japanese daily goals #language learning Japanese #日本語

Notes on ひらがな 📚✨️

Disclaimer: I haven't been posting a lot lately (life's been hectic) so I decided to start sharing some of my notes. These were taken a while back, based on Tae Kim's grammar guide.

Japanese consists of two phonetic scripts (Hiragana and Katakana, referred to as kana), with a little less than 50 characters each. Today we'll study Hiragana!

Hiragana (ひらがな) is used for a couple of reasons:

• Grammatical purposes;

• Words with really difficult/rare Kanji;

• Colloquial expressions;

• Onomatopoeias;

• Or by beginner students and children, in place of unfamiliar Kanji;

Every character in Hiragana corresponds to a [vowel] or [consonant + vowel] syllable sound, with the exception of [ん].

When practicing by hand, it's extremely important to remember that stroke order and the direction of strokes matter a lot! You don’t want to end up with the writing skills of a clumsy toddler.

(the chart bellow has hiragana and katakana btw, the hiragana characters are on the left side)

source: r/japaneseresources on reddit

Thought learning all the characters was hard enough? Fear not, there's additional sounds for you to learn.

📚 The Muddied Sounds 📚

There are five more consonant sounds that are written by affixing two tiny lines (dakuten) or a tiny circle (handakuten) to a character. This creates a less clipped version of the consonants, as you can see bellow:

source: japanistry.com

📚 The Small [や], [ゆ] and [よ] 📚

We can combine a consonant with a / ya / yu / yo sound by attaching a small [や], [ゆ] or [よ] to the /i/ vowel character of each consonant.

source: guidetojapanese.org

📚 The Small [つ] 📚

A small [つ] is inserted between characters to carry the consonant sound of the second character to the end of the first.

Note that when you encounter a small [つ] between characters, there's almost always a clipping sound to the pronounciation! You gotta make sure to clip the right consonant (the consonant of the second character).

Example: ざっし (zas-shi / magazine)

📚 The Long Vowel Sound 📚

You can extend the vowel sound of a character by adding [あ], [い] or [う] to them. See the chart bellow:

source: guidetojapanese.org

Example: to create a extended vowel sound from [か], we add a [あ] to create [かあ].

Remember to actually hold your vowels long enough, or you'll end up saying stuff like [ここ - here] instead of [こうこう - highschool].

Lastly, there are a few exceptions where and /e/ vowel is extended by adding [え] or and /o/ vowel is extended by adding [お], but those are few and far between, so pay attention but don't worry too much about it.

Example: おねえさん (older sister)

See you next time! 💌

#laura learns #laura studies #japanese langblr #japanese #japanese notes #hiragana #studyblr #student life #study blog #studyinspo #langblr #learning japanese #japanese learning #japanese studies #japanese resources

Sharks (Japanese)

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First Japanese notes!

The way I’ve planned to approach this is to first go through all hiragana and all the words that use those hiragana that are listed for JLPT N5 vocabulary. I’ll also add small notes and some additional Japanese study notes. After hiragana I’ll add katakana and kanji and will also start adding grammar at some point. But for now we are starting simple :)

#Japanese study #jlpt n5 #hiragana #Japanese notes #Japanese notes 1 #japanese studyblr #studyblr #hiragana 1

Japanese word of the day！～

失恋　「しつれん」

"unrequited love"

"broken heart"

例）彼女（かのじょ）は失恋（しつれん）した。"she was broken-hearted"

#japanese vocabulary #studyblr #japanese studyblr #langblr #japanese #studyspo #japanese langblr #learn japanese #nihongo #japan #hiragana #japanese notes #nihon #kanji #vocabulary #language learning #japanesewotd

Using Japanese From Zero! 1, I figured I would try to write out the words. Did I get any wrong?

#japanese langblr #learn japanese #japanesenotes #japanese notes #japanese vocabulary #tumblr language #language learning #language blog #learning japanese #japanese studyblr

tuesday 9 november | n1 japanese notes

sorry for the short hiatus but i’m back!

i wrote out just the words i don’t know the meaning of / have not memorised the kanji :))

i don’t plan on taking the exam at any point, i’m just reviewing the words as a refresher

#studyblr #mid-afternoon-studies #study notes #studyspo #study inspo #studyspiration #study inspiration #handwriting #study aesthetic #aesthetic notes #japanese notes #a-level

Notes on ひらがな 📚✨️

Disclaimer: I haven't been posting a lot lately (life's been hectic) so I decided to start sharing some of my notes. These were taken a while back, based on Tae Kim's grammar guide.

Japanese consists of two phonetic scripts (Hiragana and Katakana, referred to as kana), with a little less than 50 characters each. Today we'll study Hiragana!

Hiragana (ひらがな) is used for a couple of reasons:

• Grammatical purposes;

• Words with really difficult/rare Kanji;

• Colloquial expressions;

• Onomatopoeias;

• Or by beginner students and children, in place of unfamiliar Kanji;

Every character in Hiragana corresponds to a [vowel] or [consonant + vowel] syllable sound, with the exception of [ん].

When practicing by hand, it's extremely important to remember that stroke order and the direction of strokes matter a lot! You don’t want to end up with the writing skills of a clumsy toddler.

(the chart bellow has hiragana and katakana btw, the hiragana characters are on the left side)

source: r/japaneseresources on reddit

Thought learning all the characters was hard enough? Fear not, there's additional sounds for you to learn.

📚 The Muddied Sounds 📚

source: japanistry.com

📚 The Small [や], [ゆ] and [よ] 📚

We can combine a consonant with a / ya / yu / yo sound by attaching a small [や], [ゆ] or [よ] to the /i/ vowel character of each consonant.

source: guidetojapanese.org

📚 The Small [つ] 📚

A small [つ] is inserted between characters to carry the consonant sound of the second character to the end of the first.

Example: ざっし (zas-shi / magazine)

📚 The Long Vowel Sound 📚

You can extend the vowel sound of a character by adding [あ], [い] or [う] to them. See the chart bellow:

source: guidetojapanese.org

Example: to create a extended vowel sound from [か], we add a [あ] to create [かあ].

Remember to actually hold your vowels long enough, or you'll end up saying stuff like [ここ - here] instead of [こうこう - highschool].

Example: おねえさん (older sister)

See you next time! 💌

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