Level 2 Japanese Children’s Books Available from the Seattle Public Library

This is an incomplete list of all the Level 2 books available from the Seattle Public Library; it’ll be updated as I keep reading them.

From Extensive Reading in Japanese, the definition of a Level 2 book:

Level 2: Mainly hiragana and katakana text. If there are kanji, furigana is given for each kanji. The text is longer but still contains a lot of pictures to aid student comprehension. Japanese native readers would be five to eight years old.

I’ve added Amazon links for the benefit of having title images and just in case anyone wants to subsidize my reading, but if you’re interested in ordering any of these, I’d also recommend you look them up on Kinokuniya’s website and compare shipping costs. Also, all title translations are my own unless otherwise indicated, names are family name first, then given name, and 作 and 絵 mean “author” and “illustrator,” respectively.

きいろい　ことり
The Yellow Bird
作／絵：ディック・ブルーナ（Dick Bruna）
Level 2 絵本, 24 pages, 175 words (est.) ★★★★☆ hardcover

This one is by Dick Bruna, who did the Miffy books, and I do love the Miffy books (although I read them in Ann Arbor, so I haven’t written about them here) so I read this even though there’s no Miffy in it. A little yellow bird visits a farm and hears all about farm life from a friendly dog.

ばけばけ町のべろろんまつり
Spooky Town’s Slurpy Festival
作／絵：たごもりのりこ（Tagomori Noriko）
Level 2 絵本, 32 pages, 350 words (est.) ★★★★★ Hardcover

This one was awesome, so it got its own review.

ヤドカシ不動産
“Hermit Crab” Real Estate Agency
作：穂高順也（ほたかじゅんや, Hotaka Jun’ya）
絵：石井聖岳（いしいきよたか, Ishii Kiyotaka）
Level 2 絵本, 32 pages, 550 words (est.) ★★★★★ Hardcover

I pretty much just got this one because I like hermit crabs, but it was awfully cute, and a good example of how the right picture books can be a great foundation for more advanced reading; in this book, the reader learns the word for “real estate agency,” what a real estate agent does and how he or she talks, which is a better start than having to memorize twenty real-estate related words in difficult kanji all at once.

Why did I put “hermit crab” in quotes? Well, hermit crab is usually 宿借り, or “home-renter,” which makes sense if you know how hermit crabs move from shell to shell; this hermit crab is a 宿貸し, or “home-lender” because he’s in the business of finding other animals the perfect home!

ボリスとあおいかさ
Boris and the Blue Umbrella
作／絵：ディック・ブルーナ（Dick Bruna）
Level 2 絵本, 28 pages, 140 words (est.) ★★★☆☆ Hardcover

I’ve mentioned my fondness for Dick Bruna’s books before: they’re on the easy end of level 2, but the sentences are complex enough to save them from level 1, and the Miffy books I came across in Ann Arbor were the first books that really made me understand the idea of extensive reading, so even though I’m beyond them at this point I can’t help but pick them up when I see them. In this book, Boris has various adventures with his blue umbrella.

みんなで７だんね
We Can All Do Level 7!
作：宮川ひろ（みやかわひろ, Miyakawa Hiro）
絵：長谷川知子（はせがわともこ Hasegawa Tomoko）
Level 2 絵本, 40 pages, 700 words (est.) ★★★★☆ Hardcover

Atsuko has decreased use of her left arm and leg because of a childhood illness, so PE class is a challenge for her; when the class has to practice jumping over the vaulting box, she can barely make it over the first levels. (This is not a gadget I was aware of before, as I’m decidedly not a gymnast; it’s an adjustable hurdle, or 跳び箱.) Will she ever be able to pass level 7 along with her classmates? This one, as the word count indicates, is on the higher end of level 2.