June 2019 Reading Calendar Breakdown

And we’re back. My week off was almost too rejuvenating as I came to terms with having a more relaxed release schedule moving forward. Even as I’m working on this and outlining a handful of other posts in the future, I feel that little nagging voice in the back of my head telling me that it needs to be ready for a next-day release. Luckily, it doesn’t. From here on we’re taking our time, relaxing, and putting more effort and care into our posts because we can afford to.




Today’s post is the start of a new series of posts moving forward. Starting with today, every month I will be making a post going over my reading calendar goals for that month. We’ll be taking a look at what I’m choosing to read, why, and in what daily quantity. My goal with this is to help encourage the idea of more people picking up reading calendars, even if it’s not for manga. Reading is an easy, relaxing, and accessible hobby and setting daily reading goals for yourself encourages you to constantly read in a rewarding manner. At the bare minimum, you’ll be able to look back through your calendar at the days you’ve crossed off and see how much more you’ve been reading since you started keeping track, and if you read manga then you can get an AniList or MyAnimeList account and keep track on there as well so you can feel accomplished as you can flex bigger and bigger numbers to the lesser weebs.




There are a couple of rules that I impose on myself when it comes to outlining things on my calendar: I try to limit myself to what I know will take around an hour a day to complete, I only set two series at a time, and I let at least one series bleed over into the following month so I have a starting point for the next time I’m scheduling my reading. Determining estimated reading time is entirely done through trial and error, and there are no right or wrong goals when it comes to setting daily limits. This is actually a very good month to point out how flexible this can be, so let us begin without further ado.




Groove Adventure Rave / Rave Master - May 17 - June 2




This is our leftover series from May. I had previously been reading it in short bursts so I decided to buckle down and throw it on the calendar with a 15-chapter limit to ensure I got through it in a timely manner. Rave is one of those series that I remember people loving when I was a kid but I had never experienced it, and reading through it now has shown me just why it was as popular as it was. Rave is a textbook shonen battle manga featuring a Chosen One hero on a quest to save the world with his mascot character, love interest but not really, and rag-tag group of former villains who were converted to the side of good by the hero’s overwhelming sense of justice. Hiro Mashima doesn’t really write for people in their mid-20s but Rave has a certain charm to it as it encapsulates that early 2000s shonen battle manga spirit.




The Voynich Hotel - June 1 - June 6




Another series that I had picked up and dropped for no real reason, except I really have no clue why I lost interest with this one. Sayman Dowman is one of my favorite authors on the planet and is by far my favorite artist. The Voynich Hotel is one of his more well-known works and showcases his writing style very well, especially his deadpan deliveries of dry yet over-the-top jokes and his passion for dropping odd references such as loosely basing the story around Italian Horror filmmaker Dario Argento’s “Three Mothers” trilogy. There are only 68 chapters in this so I set my limit at 10 a day. The story here is that of an island community containing assassins, a serial killer, a bumbling police android, and a hotel owned by a luchador that employs ancient witches. It sounds like there’s a lot going on and there initially is, but the beauty of the series is watching it all tie together.




Ninja Shinobu-san no Junjou - June 3 - June 4




I replaced Rave with 5 chapters of Shinobu-san a day to give myself a breather and it worked out perfectly because I only had ten chapters total left for the series. Shinobu-san is a slice of life romance featuring a girl named Shinobu who is obviously a ninja but constantly denies it and asserts that she is just an average high school girl. The series doesn’t bring any particularly thought-provoking ideas to the table, but it’s only 30 chapters long so it’s nice filler material.




Tonari no Kaibutsu-kun - June 5 - June 12



Kaibutsu-kun has been sitting in Reading Hell on my list for years now. I read the first 18 chapters as it was ending about five or six years ago, and now I’m aiming to complete it in a week. It’s currently June 9 as I’m writing this post so I’m in the midst of reading 5 chapters a day and so far I can safely say that it’s a very good romance although at times it feels like there’s too much going on. The story follows a serious, studious girl named Shizuku as she’s confessed to by an eccentric boy named Haru who’s known around school for being a brash delinquent. Haru is a wonderful character and he alone makes this series worth reading. This also got a western release under the name My Little Monster.




Amaama to Inazuma - June 7 - June 14




This one hasn’t been in Reading Hell for more than a few months and it’s just something that I’ve been meaning to finish so I’m reading 5 chapters a day. Amaama to Inazuma is in that “Single Parent” subgenre that we looked through during APADFTMOM and it gets double points for also being an educational cooking series with each chapter’s recipe posted in full at the end of the chapter. Kohei is a teacher whose wife passed away, causing him to need to raise their daughter Tsumugi on his own. Kohei sucks at cooking and sets out to change that with Tsumugi and one of his students, and the three begin bonding over food. Tsumugi is by far the star of the series and embodies all of the traits in her role as previously discussed in the APADFTMOM post.




InuYasha - June 13 - June 28




OH BOY. This is the big entry for the month. Starting at 150 chapters, I will be reading 25 chapters a day until completion. That sounds like a lot and it certainly is, but InuYasha is actually surprisingly easy to read. The story’s very easy to follow, the characters are likeable enough, and the plot doesn’t drag too much so far. My concern is that there are 400 chapters between my starting and finishing points and that’s a lot of opportunity for filler. If InuYasha somehow manages to get through all of those chapters with little to no filler then it’s an instant five star series.




Haji-Otsu - June 15 - June 20




Now we’re getting into uncharted waters. Up until this point I’ve used my calendar mainly as a way to thin out my Reading list, but my Reading list is getting pretty thin aside from some really long works that I don’t feel like tackling just yet. I’ll be starting Haji-Otsu from scratch and going in completely blind at 5 chapters a day. Haji-Otsu looks like a promising fluff series centered around a girl who dislikes or fears men and gets roped into a relationship to try and alleviate that, so we’ll see how it goes.




Ane Doki - June 21 - June 25




I’m not gonna lie: Not only am I starting this from the beginning, I don’t really know what it’s about. Someone on Reddit recommended it to me almost a year ago and I’ve loved all of his other recommendations so I’m kind of excited to start this. This will be another limit set at 5 chapters a day. Ane Doki was written by the same author as Ichigo 100% which is on my Eventually list. Reddit Bro, if you find this then thank you for the joy you’ve brought to me over this past year.




Akikan - June 26




Akikan has been on my Eventually list for at least a decade. It’s time to get it over with. It’s 7 chapters long and about a can of melon soda that turns into a girl. Riveting.




Kagamigami - June 27 - July 1




I’m reading 10 chapters of Kagamigami a day because I love stories about supernatural investigations. The first couple of seasons of Supernatural are prime examples of this, as is the first half or so of Muhyo to Rouji no Mahoritsu Soudan Jimusou. There’s just something really cool about the investigation process and methods. It’s that type of fiction that builds off of reality instead of creating a whole new world by asking how supernatural crimes would be handled if they existed and we just didn’t know.




School Rumble - June 29 - July 10




Somebody once described School Rumble as Nisekoi but better and I’m currently a little under halfway done with the intent of reading 15 chapters a day, and to be honest I think it’s fine. School Rumble’s main characters shine brighter than Nisekoi’s, but Nisekoi allows more characters to shine. School Rumble is an over-the-top silly romantic comedy following a love triangle between a well-meaning delinquent, a well-meaning idiot, and a well-meaning oddball as they get into romantic hijinks while roping their friends into their messes. It’s a pretty easy read and I’m eager to finish it.




And with that, we have my month of June laid out. It’s a bit romance-heavy due to May being very action-heavy with Psyren, Buso Renkin, Claymore, and Rave, and I’m fine with that. We’ll meet back here at the beginning of July to see how June was and where our future leads to. I’m kind of feeling like it'll be sports manga.