I finished reading my first novel in Japanese yesterday! I am quite excited about it. Last November, I wrote about receiving a Japanese translation of Little House in the Big Woods. Yesterday morning, I had two pages to go before the last chapter. I read the those pages and went on to finish the last chapter! The last chapter was rather short, but I think it was the most I have read so far in one sitting in Japanese!

While reading, I made the decision not to stop and look up new words, but to highlight them to look up later. I know that there are some that cringe at the idea of marking up a book, but I think that this book felt big and important to be studied so diligently. After I finish looking up the words, I intend to go back and use this book for reading aloud.

This series is my spouse’s favorite childhood series, and she knows it almost by heart. This has been quite helpful in that I have been able to check my comprehension by telling her what I thought happened. The only trouble has been that at times, she has gotten so excited that she has told me what will be coming up before I have stopped her.

In celebration of my completion, my spouse and I played with the paper dolls she bought me a while ago, when she visited the Laura Ingalls Wilder home and museum in Missouri on the way to visit her mother and brother. Then we went out for lunch.

Today, I started the next book in the series, 大草原の小さな家, Little House on the Prairie, which my spouse gave me for my birthday this year. This one is a different translation using the older Helen Sewell illustrations. Hopefully, my Japanese has improved enough that I will be able to get through this one a little faster, although it does look a little harder than the first book. It is exciting, though.