Born 1973 in Osaka and based in Tokyo, Shibasaki Tomoka published Kyo no Dekigoto (“A Day on the Planet”) in 2000, and a film adaptation of that novel was released in 2003. Her 2007 book Sono Machi no Ima wa (“That Town Today”) won a MEXT Award for New Artists as well as the Oda Sakunosuke Prize and the Sakuya Konohana Award. In 2010 she won the Noma Literary New Face Prize for Netemo Sametemo (“Whether Asleep or Awake”), and her 2014 novel Haru no Niwa (Spring Garden) won the Akutagawa Prize. In 2024 she won the Minister of Education Award for Literature and the Tanizaki Prize for Tsuzuki to Hajimari (“Continuings and Beginnings”). She is also the author of novels including Panorama, Sen no Tobira (“A Thousand Doors”), and Hyakunen to Ichinichi (“Hundred Years and a Day”), and several essay collections, including Shiran Kedo Nikki (“I Don’t Know, It’s a Diary”).