(born December 28, 1949) is the pen name of , a popular contemporary Japanese writer, mainly of short stories.

Biography

Kitamura was born in the town of

Sugito is a List of towns in Japan, town located in Saitama Prefecture, Japan. , the town had an estimated population of 44,402 in 19,409 households and a population density of 1500 persons per km². The total area of the town is . Geography Sugito is ...

Saitama Prefecture is a landlocked prefecture of Japan located in the Kantō region of Honshu. Saitama Prefecture has a population of 7,338,536 (1 January 2020) and has a geographic area of 3,797 km2 (1,466 sq mi). Saitama Prefecture borders Tochigi Prefectur ...

. He studied literature at

Waseda University , mottoeng = Independence of scholarship , established = 21 October 1882 , type = Private , endowment = , president = Aiji Tanaka , city = Shinjuku , state = Tokyo , country = Japan , students = 47,959 , undergrad = 39,382 , postgrad ...

in Tokyo, and was a member of the Waseda Mystery Club while a student there. However, after graduating from Waseda in 1972, he returned to Saitama to become a language teacher at

Kasukabe High School Saitama Prefectural Kasukabe High School (埼玉県立春日部高等学校 Saitama-kenritsu Kasukabe Kōtōgakkō) is a secondary school located in Kasukabe, Saitama, Japan. Founded in 1899, the School incorporates the Maltese Cross in its emb ...

, his alma mater. He began his fiction writing career only after teaching for almost twenty years, and stopped teaching in 1993 to devote himself completely to writing once established as an author. He made his writing debut using a pen name. Initially, because the unnamed first-person protagonist of his early works was a female college student, and the name Kaoru is gender ambiguous, it was widely speculated that Kitamura was female. This speculation persisted until he revealed his identity upon accepting the

Mystery Writers of Japan Award The are presented every year by the Mystery Writers of Japan. They honor the best in crime fiction and critical/biographical work published in the previous year. MWJ Award for Best Novel winners (1948–1951, 1976–present) MWJ Award for Best ...

in 1991.

Works

Kitamura is known as a writer of mysteries, and rather than the detective and crime stories of traditional mystery, his work mainly focuses on the logical resolution of more "ordinary" puzzles and questions encountered in everyday life. He is considered a pioneer of this style of mystery in Japan, called , which has since been taken up by many other writers. He made his literary debut in 1989, with the publication of , and has been writing prolifically since then. He won the 44th

in 1991 for , the 6th

Honkaku Mystery Award The are presented every year by the Honkaku Mystery Writers Club of Japan. They honor the best in honkaku (i.e. authentic, orthodox) mystery fiction and critical works published in the previous year. Honkaku Mystery Award for Best Fiction winne ...

in 2006 for , and the 2006 Baka-Misu Award for the same work. In 2009, after repeated previous nominations, he won the prestigious

Naoki Prize The Naoki Prize, officially , is a Japanese literary award presented biannually. It was created in 1935 by Kikuchi Kan, then editor of the ''Bungeishunjū'' magazine, and named in memory of novelist Naoki Sanjugo. Sponsored by the Society for ...

(the 141st) for . His works have been adapted for film, television, and

manga Manga ( Japanese: 漫画 ) are comics or graphic novels originating from Japan. Most manga conform to a style developed in Japan in the late 19th century, and the form has a long prehistory in earlier Japanese art. The term ''manga'' is use ...

Selected bibliography

References

* (Includes a brief English biography of Kitamura) * *

External links

J'Lit , Authors : Kaoru Kitamura , Books from Japan

English language review of film adaption of ''Turn'' * http://www.kitamura-tei.com Japanese language fan site {{DEFAULTSORT:Kitamura, Kaoru 1949 births Naoki Prize winners Japanese mystery writers Mystery Writers of Japan Award winners Honkaku Mystery Award winners Japanese male short story writers Living people Waseda University alumni Writers from Saitama Prefecture

Biography

Works

Selected bibliography

See also

References

External links