Born 1979 in Nara Prefecture, Japan. Debuted in 2003 with Taiyō no tō (Tower of the sun), which he wrote while studying at Kyoto University, and won the 15th Japan Fantasy Novel Award. In 2006, he received the Yamamoto Shūgorō Prize for The Night is Short, Walk On Girl, and in 2010, Penguin Highway took the Japan SF Grand Prize. Other works include Uchōten kazoku (The eccentric family) and Nettai (The tropics). “The 20th Century Hotel” originally appeared in Shōsetsu Tripper’s Summer 2015 issue.