I am a literary giant in Japan

Chapter 249 People who like Mr. Kitagawa’s novels are definitely not bad people!
After reading the first three novels of "The Eternal No. 24", Kitagawa Hideya was a little impressed by the mature writing skills of Momota Naoki.

He had some impression of these three short stories, but he didn't know that they were all written by Naoki Momota.

In the original time and space, they were later filmed into film and television dramas, but the ratings were not very good.

"The Man Who Broke the 'Golden Sub-Weightweight'" was a total lousy movie, with ratings ultimately failing to exceed 5%, and the second season was canceled by Kanto TV.

"The Man Called Pirate" is slightly better, with an average viewership rate of 9% in the time period. It cannot be called a flop, but it is still far from being excellent. It is the kind of TV series that will soon be forgotten by the audience.

Only "Fortuna's Eyes" became a small hit and was made into a movie of the same name by Toho in 2019, starring Ryunosuke Kamiki and "Village Flower" Kasumi Arimura, and the final box office was about 13.7 billion yen.

The era when it really became popular was after 2020 when short videos became popular.

Thanks to various editings by marketing accounts, those love movies that are actually mediocre in viewing experience have become the cornerstone of love short videos with a playback volume that easily exceeds 10 million, just like old songs being refurbished online.

But due to the limitations of the original work, these three works are just so-so and have nothing to do with being a hit.

However, in this "desert version" of the Japanese literary world where high-quality literary works are scarce and a large number of writers have been lost, "Eternal No. 24" has truly set off a "short story fever."

Oricon, which always likes to get involved in other people's affairs, released the latest issue of the Oricon chart early the next morning.

The list shows that the December issue of "Shincho" sold an astonishing 12 copies on the first day of printing, which shows readers' love for "Forever No. 27.7".

After seeing the data, Rena Saito's dark circles due to not sleeping all night became even darker.

As soon as she got to work, she ran to the data analysis department to get the real sales data table of "Shincho", which showed 23.6 copies. Not as high as written on the Oricon chart, but it had indeed broken the 20-copy sales mark on the first day of publication.

Putting aside those ancient great gods, at present only Kitagawa Hide has achieved similar achievements!

A formidable rival indeed!
This made Saito Rena, who was originally full of confidence, worried.

Kitagawa Hide had already sent her the manuscripts of six short stories in advance. The quality of the manuscripts was beyond doubt, and at least half of them were good enough to be recorded in history.

But she really couldn't guarantee whether it would be as popular as "Forever No. 24".

Because Naoki Momota's "Eternal 24th" is actually a tricky work that uses the banner of pure literature but contains popular literature content.

As we all know, popular literature pays more attention to the interesting story plot. When the length is extremely short, pure literature does not focus on the story content. In the eyes of readers, it can easily be replaced by popular literature of the same length.

This is also the reason why there are so few pure literary short stories and their quality is so poor.

It’s not that people don’t want to write well, but writing a good pure literary short story is much more difficult than other types.

It's a thankless task.

It just so happened that the six manuscripts sent by Kitagawa Hide were not only all pure literary novels, but also opened up a new style of writing.

"The Japanese style of mono no aware, the ultimate aesthetic writing style, will this kind of pure literary novel really be accepted by the public?"

Rena Saito is a little worried about the aesthetic ability of most readers in this impetuous society.

Many famous classics handed down from generation to generation are prone to an embarrassing situation - they remain lukewarm for a long time after publication, or are even regarded as shit.

The more advanced the concept is, and the more different the work is from the average aesthetic level of the public, the more likely such a misunderstanding is to occur.

But now the manuscript has been sent to the distribution department, and the new issue of "Wenyi" will be published soon. She can only pray that this unique aesthetic style will be liked by the public.

the other side.

The first-day sales of 23.6 copies allowed Naoki Momota to host a champagne party in his own villa.

After being "exiled" overseas by the Japanese literary world for many years, he, who was the worst off among the older generation of "the best in the world", finally has a day to hold his head up high. It's really cool!

Naoki Hyakuta is not as conceited as Yoshiro Masayuki. Although he once wanted to enter politics, he is quite ambitious and more patient.

After a day of celebration, he also deeply felt the great threat posed by the young man.

Even though the new book was so successful and had the support of Shinchosha, the leader of the five major publishing houses, the data on the first day of publication did not break the terrifying record of 25.7 copies set in the previous issue of "Wenyi".

This shows Kitagawa Hide's appeal and strong strength in the current Japanese literary world.

Naoki Momota even specially bought a stack of Kitagawa Hide's books to read.

After watching it, his opinion of Kitagawa Hide was raised to a higher level. He even thought that if their positions were not different, it would be nothing to add him in to make money in harmony.

What a pity. What a pity.

This guy first set up the Aum Shinrikyo cult and offended a group of hidden wealthy people, and then frantically incited social hot spots, promoted legislation, and slapped many politicians in the face.

Not long ago, he used war literature to disgust a large number of financial groups and right-wing figures behind the Liberal Democratic Party.

Everyone knows that in Japan, you are either neutral or right-wing. People who lean to the left will never be able to reach the center of power and interests.

I heard that he even rejected the Tanizaki Prize and insisted on fighting to the death with domestic literary awards.

Young people like this are destined to not go far.

Even if there was no Naoki Hyakuta and no Raiyoshi Ma, there would be other "best in the world" to criticize him.

What’s more, there is a “number one in the world” sitting above everyone’s head.

Naoki Momota didn't believe that this young man was perfect without a single black spot.

As long as there is, they will find a way to take advantage of it and make him never stand up again. "What a pity, it's really a pity." Momota Naoki sighed again.

Kitagawa Hide had no idea that he had been sentenced to death for no apparent reason by Momota Naoki.

After finally finishing the first six short stories, he began to think about the next six, hoping to finish them all by the end of the year and successfully catch up with the nomination for the Nobel Prize.

The money in his bank account also snowballed from 30 billion to 48.5 billion, and this is the amount he accumulated despite his constant spending.

Starting from next year, the Japanese yen will continue to depreciate until after 2020. Now the exchange rate of the Japanese yen to the neighboring RMB is still 10:1. After the millennium, it will move towards 20:1.

The same is true for the exchange rate with the US dollar.

Therefore, Kitagawa Hide decisively asked Senhara Masato for help to convert the extra money into US dollars - although he did not understand finance, he would definitely not suffer losses from currency depreciation!
While Masato Senhara was anxiously helping to exchange foreign currency and taking care of the business of Kitagawa Entertainment, Kitagawa Network and other companies, the December 1996 issue of "Wenyi" was gradually put on the shelves in bookstores across the country.

The popularity of "Shincho" has sparked a short story craze, and readers are also looking forward to Kitagawa Hide's new work.

As early as the night before the magazine went on sale, many readers lined up to buy the magazine. The long queues looked as exaggerated as the ticket-grabbing crowds during the Spring Festival travel rush.

Although Kawaide Shobo and many bookstores have repeatedly stated that this time "Wenyi" will definitely not have the embarrassing situation of being out of stock as before, they will ensure that every reader can buy the magazine and read the novel at the first time.

But they still didn't believe it.

Once bitten by a snake, you will be afraid of well ropes for ten years!

The bookstore had no choice but to adjust the opening time from 8:6 a.m. to : a.m.

Otherwise, it would be too inhumane to let a group of readers wait outside all night in the middle of winter!
12:18 am, December 6th.

Chihaya Ruri, holding breakfast bread and hot milk in her hands, blinked her tired eyes. When she heard the bookstore open, she suddenly became excited and followed the flow of people to squeeze inside.

Many people think that Japan is a very civilized country.

In fact, it is just a very ordinary country, but it prefers to be "civilized" on the surface and takes "not causing trouble to others" as its principle.

When things touch their interests and bottom line, many people's true colors are revealed.

For example, some people hate garbage sorting so much that they secretly throw it away at night; some people can't stand the overly "polite" social interactions, so they get drunk and throw tantrums, showing their low standards.

Only certain places in certain cities are spotless. In many places that foreigners cannot see, there are mountains of garbage, poor sanitation, etc.

To maintain the image of a "modest gentleman", one has to suppress one's nature.

When society is overly repressive, people will become distorted.

This is also the reason why Japan is home to so many perverts.

Chihaya Ruri was wearing a JK uniform and her skirt was 15 centimeters above her knees. She was squeezed like a rag doll in the crowd, staggering from side to side.

At this moment, she felt very regretful, extremely regretful.

Why didn’t you listen to the housekeeper and come buy the book yourself?
You can be a young lady, why do you have to experience the life of a commoner?

Just when she was about to explode, a small hand suddenly reached out and rescued her from the crowd.

Chihaya Ruri let out a long sigh, put her clothes in order, and thanked the clerk who saved her with a well-behaved face.

"Thank you very much, clerk-san." Halfway through her bow and halfway through her words, Chihaya Ruri was suddenly stunned.

"You are a bumpkin from Izu?"

"Good morning, Chihaya-san!" Kaoru, who was experiencing work life in the store, bowed slightly to her and smiled.

After helping Kitagawa Hide write a book, Kaoru had a clearer understanding of her future life plan, and she wanted to learn more about the publishing industry and the literary world.

However, she was a high school student and working part-time was illegal, so Mengzi used some connections to arrange for her to observe and learn in a bookstore.

There is also a "Study and Observation" plaque hanging on Kaoru's chest, indicating that she is not a part-time clerk, so as to avoid being seen and taken advantage of by someone with ulterior motives, which would then harm the bookstore.

"Chihaya-san is here to buy magazines too, right?" Kaoru took Chihaya Ruri's hand and led her to a row of bookshelves with familiarity.

After several weekends of observation and learning, Kaoru's professional ability has been honed. Her previous shy personality has changed a lot. Judging from her appearance and conversation, she is completely different from the image of a "country bumpkin from Izu" that Chihaya Ruri had when she first met her.

"You" Chihaya Ruri blushed, not knowing what to say or do, so she could only follow her.

"Here~ Chihaya-san wants to buy "Bai Yi", right?
I'm studying here, and the store manager said he could give me five copies of "Literature" for free. I'll give this one to Chihaya as a gift!

Please accept it!" Xunzi continued with a sweet smile.

Although Chihaya Ruri always formed cliques at school to mock her background and personality, they didn't do anything really excessive.

Moreover, after getting along with her for a while, Kaoru had already discovered that she was a girl with a "sharp tongue but a soft heart". She always made fun of her on the surface, but when someone really wanted to bully Kaoru, they would soon be secretly taught a lesson by Chihaya Ruri and others.

In the words of Mr. Kitagawa, what is this called?

Seems like tsundere?
In short, Kaoru is not opposed to being classmates with Chihaya Ruri, and after learning that she also likes to read Kitagawa's novels, she has a better impression of her.

People who like Mr. Kitagawa’s novels are definitely not bad people!
"You...I..." Chihaya Ruri's face turned even redder!

(End of this chapter)