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His novels were written in the Meiji period and use many nearly archaic words and phrases. They are hard reads for native speakers of Japanese also. I suggest you read children's books or Shinichi Hoshi's short stories instead. [my sentences]

Is the position of also correct?

I have seen a few times a native speaker of American English use "also" at the end of a sentence, but I am not sure if the position of also is correct in the second sentence.

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    It's a "valid", but not very idiomatic form. We usually put also BEFORE the noun or clause it modifies, or too AFTER, not the other way around. Also hard readings isn't idiomatic. Consider a difficult read. But all of this looks like Off Topic proofreading to me.
    – FumbleFingers
    Commented Nov 2 at 12:33

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"They are hard readings for native speakers of Japanese also." Does not sound idiomatic to a native English speaker (unlike the other two sentences which are fine). A native speaker would probably use even rather than also and say something like

Even native Japanese speakers find them hard to read.

or

They are a hard read even for native Japanese speakers.

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  • I couldn't come up with the sentence "Even native Japanese speakers find them hard to read". Thank you very much, @Peter Jennings.
    – Kaguyahime
    Commented Nov 2 at 13:24
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also is idiomatic there but it is not instantly clear, since this semantic link was left unspoken:

His novels were written in the Meiji period and use many nearly archaic words and phrases, which are a special challenge for non-native speakers. They are hard readings for native speakers of Japanese also.

"hard readings", however, is not idiomatic. You would want to say "difficult works" (somewhat formal) or "hard books" (quite colloquial) or "hard to read" (also somewhat informal). Peter's suggestion, "a hard read", is certainly idiomatic though it strikes a somewhat casual note, as "read" used as a noun has a dash of slang.

P.S. We use "readings" mainly in the context of excerpted passages that might form the basis of a discussion about a certain subject.

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  • Thank you very much, @TimR. Is "They are a hard read" better than "They are hard reads"?
    – Kaguyahime
    Commented Nov 2 at 12:49
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    I added a comment about "a hard read" being a kind of casual, somewhat slangy usage, and the plural "hard reads" doubles-down on that somewhat flippant tone, which I think is not suited to your paragraph. Of all the choices, "difficult works" fits best with the tone of your paragraph, assuming you want a noun phrase; but you could also say something like "are challenging" instead, or "are far from easy reads" if you wanted to end on an informal note. The tone of "easy reads" is suitable for a discussion of easy reads :-)
    – TimR
    Commented Nov 2 at 12:57
  • Thank you very much for your detailed explanation.
    – Kaguyahime
    Commented Nov 2 at 13:19

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