Kikuko Tsumura
is a Japanese writer from Osaka. She has won numerous Japanese literary awards, including the Akutagawa Prize, the Noma Literary New Face Prize, the Dazai Osamu Prize, the Kawabata Yasunari Prize, and the Oda Sakunosuke Prize. Early life and education Tsumura was born in Osaka, Japan in 1978. While commuting to school she read science fiction novels, especially the work of William Gibson, Philip K. Dick, and Kurt Vonnegut, and began writing her own novel, Man'ītā (Maneater), while still a third-year university student. Man'ītā won the 21st Dazai Osamu Prize and was later published in book form under the title Kimi wa eien ni soitsura yori wakai. Career In her first job out of college, Tsumura experienced workplace harassment and quit after ten months to retrain and find another position, an experience that inspired her to write stories about young workers. In 2008 Tsumura won the Noma Literary New Face Prize for her book Myūjikku buresu yū!! (Music Bless You!!), and in 2009 her novel Potosu raimu no fune (The Lime Pothos Boat), about a young woman experiencing precarious work, won the 140th Akutagawa Prize. Japanese literature scholar Kendall Heitzman described The Lime Pothos Boat as a "triumph" that "carefully