Since 2016, J-Novel Club has been releasing some of the best light novel content Japan has to offer. It all began with a simple enough problem: how to get hot new titles to the English-speaking audience at high quality, but without the usual long wait after their release in Japan. A solution had to be found, and J-Novel Club was the answer!
So how do we do it?
We start in the digital realm, bringing the books out in weekly parts—often just like how they’re first published in Japan! When the parts are done, we then release the ebook editions for readers to buy, and the cycle begins anew with the next volume. Our subscribers get access to the weekly parts, keeping fans like you at the front of the curve, before the retail release date!
It’s also important to us that our readership forms a community—the core of our “club”—and our management, translators, and editors are encouraged to interact directly with the members via our forums, social media, and Discord server.
So far, so good. But there were new mountains to climb!
In 2018, we began printing our own physical editions. Each month, we put out a handful of new books, picking series that we know the collectors among you will love. These include some of our newest and hottest series like Ascendance of a Bookworm and In Another World With My Smartphone, as well as hardcover collections of fan favorites such as Full Metal Panic! and Slayers. 2018 was also J-Novel Club’s first foray into manga, bringing out a mix of light novel adaptations and original series.
2019 saw the birth of J-Novel Heart, our imprint for shojo and josei titles. Under this new banner, we began publishing light novels with a focus on romantic storylines to better present our readers with expanded options and to reach out to previously underserved audiences. We’re pleased to present readers with fan-favorite series like My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! and The White Cat's Revenge as Plotted from the Dragon King's Lap.
2020 continued to see rapid growth for the company and our membership, with over eight thousand people following our company Twitter account and the start of J-Novel Club Livestreams, where we make frequent new title announcements and host Q&A sessions with our staff!
This year is sure to bring further exciting additions as well. Anything can happen, so get subscribed and keep reading!
