Kanae Minato 湊 かなえ

Kanae Minato (1973–) was, even as a child, a passionate fan of Maurice Leblanc and Edogawa Rampo. After graduating from university she spent two years in Tonga as a Japan Overseas Cooperation Volunteer, returning home to become a high-school home economics teacher and later get married. She started writing in her thirties, initially hoping to become a scriptwriter. In 2005 one of her scripts won an Excellence Award in a competition for new writers sponsored by a satellite TV channel, and another won the Radio Drama Composition Prize in 2007. That same year, Seishokusha (The Saint) won the Shōsetsu Suiri New Writers Prize, marking Minato’s debut as a writer of fiction. Kokuhaku (Confessions; tr. 2014), her first work published in book form and the first chapter of which is based on Seishokusha, received the 2009 Booksellers Award and became an overnight bestseller. Her 2011 title Hana no kusari (Chain of Flowers), a longitudinal history centered on three women, expanded the mystery genre in entirely new directions. In 2016 she received the Yamamoto Shūgorō Prize for Yūtopia (Utopia), a small-town ensemble story with a mystery twist. She was also nominated for both the Yoshikawa Eiji Prize for New Writers and the Naoki Prize, for Ribāsu (Reverse) and Poizun dōtā, hōrī mazā (Poison Daughter, Holy Mother) respectively, establishing her as an awards-list regular. Other works include Shōjo (Girl), Shokuzai (Atonement), and Yakō kanransha (Ferris Wheel at Night).