Issun-boshi, the Inch-High Samurai who rows to the capital in a rice bowl, paired with Kaguya Hime, the bamboo cutter's daughter who came from the moon. Both are among the oldest stories in Japanese.
The 2 stories in this book
- The Inch-High Samurai
- Kaguya Hime
How each story is laid out
- Line by line. Each sentence gets its own page, with furigana over every kanji and the vocabulary and grammar explained underneath.
- The whole story again in Japanese, without the notes, so you can read it straight through.
- Native audio. Yumi reads every story at normal speed and slowly. Scan the QR code on the page to listen.
- Exercises after every story: comprehension questions, particle fill-ins and more, with an answer key.
- An English translation of every story, close enough to the Japanese to check yourself against.
What you get
- The paperback, 2026 Revised Edition: 136 pages, 5.5 x 8.5 inches.
- The eBook and audio, right away. PDF, ePub, MP3 audio and an Anki flashcard deck, ready to download as soon as you order. No waiting for the mail.
- The book in the Makoto+ Japanese Explorer app (iPhone, iPad and Android). It unlocks automatically for the email you order with, and the unlock code is printed in the back of the book too.
This is Volume 3 of Learn Japanese with Stories. Prefer to go all digital? The Learn Japanese with Stories Bundle #1 has all ten volumes (1 to 10) as eBooks with audio.
Buy 3 Clay & Yumi paperbacks, get a 4th free. Mix any titles. The discount is applied automatically at checkout.
Ships from the US to anywhere in the world.
Learn Japanese with Stories Volume 3: The Inch-High Samurai is a 136-page paperback reader (2026 Revised Edition) in the Learn Japanese with Stories series: Japanese with full furigana, line-by-line vocabulary and grammar notes, the text again without notes, an English translation, and native audio. The code printed in the back unlocks the book in the free Makoto+ Japanese Explorer app for iPhone, iPad and Android, where you can tap any word for its reading and meaning.
