[princessmarisa]

I am not sure of OP's level , but the only Japanese books written in Japanese to learn Japanese I can think of to recommend, are those for children, I have a couple of hello kitty "learn the animals", "my first Kanji", "my daily routine" type things.

You need to be able to read hiragana/katakana into English phonetics and have a basic grasp of grammer then can use these books to get a few more nouns,the odd verb, but it is slow, and immersive as may be, not so interesting or engaging because, a Japanese child might like to learn DOG, CAT, TOOTHBRUSH, to point and shout out at things, I myself want to know more useful and interesting words and phrases. I use a combination of Genki/Minna no Nihongo type books, trying to bluff my way through websites looking up bits I don't know on online dictionaries (not whole sentance translators, this hinders you more, unless you are just double-checking yourself) have grammar books and sites I use. Lots of different things, and I have been at it (all be it casually) for years and still can understand about one word in 50 in a newspaper if lucky!

Childrens books are the way forward, IMHO if you want Japanese material, then from that build up to adults books then finally onto newspapers across YEARS of study.

Kinda hoping OP is trolling about, but it makes you think, how nice would it be if you could just learn "like in the movies" by looking at a few books and newspapers, staring at them and immersing till it all sinks in, pronunciation being learnt from overhearing a couple dozen conversations ..ahh dreams..