Yukiko Motoya

is a Japanese novelist, playwright, theatre director, and former voice actress. She has won numerous Japanese literary and dramatic awards, including the Akutagawa Prize, the Noma Literary New Face Prize, the Mishima Yukio Prize, the Kenzaburo Oe Prize, the Kishida Kunio Drama Award, and the Tsuruya Nanboku Drama Award. Her work has been adapted multiple times for film.

Early life and education Motoya was born in Hakusan, Ishikawa. As a child she read mystery stories by Agatha Christie, Arthur Conan Doyle, and Edogawa Ranpo, as well as horror manga. After completing high school, Motoya moved to Tokyo to study acting, and won a voice acting role in the Hideaki Anno anime adaptation of Kare Kano, but switched her focus to writing after a teacher praised a short play Motoya wrote for the school's graduation ceremony. She appears in the ending sequences of FLCL during credits, in which she's listed as model.

Career Novelist In 2002, prompted by a magazine editor's invitation, Motoya made her fiction debut with the short story Eriko to zettai (Eriko and Absolutely). and was later adapted into a 2018 film of the same name. Though Nurui doku did not win the Akutagawa Prize, it won the 33rd Noma Literary New Face Prize. Motoya subsequently won the 7th Kenzaburo Oe Prize for her 2012 collection Arashi no pikunikku (Picnic in the Storm),

In 2016, on her fourth nomination, Motoya won the 154th Akutagawa Prize for her story Irui konin tan (Tales of Marriage to a Different Sort), in which a wife discovers that she and her husband look more and more alike as they grow older together. At the prize ceremony the press commented on her mismatched socks, leading Motoya to admit that she had not expected to win, and had rushed to the prize ceremony without any special preparation. The prize-winning work became the title story of a collection of four stories published later that year by Kodansha.

In 2018 a collection of Motoya's stories, translated into English by Asa Yoneda, was published under the title The Lonesome Bodybuilder in the United States. It included a new translation of Irui konin tan under the title "An Exotic Marriage". Writing for The New York Times, Weike Wang praised Motoya's stories, noting that Motoya "wins over her audience by pushing the absurd to extremes". Nilanjana Roy, in her review for the Financial Times, concluded that "Yukiko Motoya’s shivery, murmuring voice will never completely leave you".

Playwright and director Motoya continued writing and directing plays for her theatre company while also writing short stories and novels, and in 2006 she became the youngest person ever to win the Tsuruya Nanboku Memorial Award for Best Play, which she received for her play Sōnan (Distress). An English version of her play Vengeance can Wait, translated by Kyoko Yoshida and Andy Bragen, premiered in 2008 at the Best of Boroughs Festival in New York City. In 2009 her play Shiawase saiko arigatō maji de, about a woman who enters a couple's home and declares that she is the husband's mistress, won the 53rd Kishida Kunio Drama Award. Starting in 2014 she was a regular host for Season 4 of the TBS Radio program "The Top 5". As of 2017 she is co-host of the Fuji TV documentary series 7 Rules.

Personal life In 2013 Motoya married the poet, lyricist and film director Kite Okachimachi. Her first daughter was born in October 2015.

Recognition 2006 10th Tsuruya Nanboku Drama Award, Best Play category 2009 53rd Kishida Kunio Drama Award 2011 33rd Noma Literary New Face Prize 2013 7th Ōe Kenzaburō Prize 2014 27th Mishima Yukio Prize 2016 154th Akutagawa Prize (2015下)

Film and other adaptations Funuke domo, kanashimi no ai o misero (Funuke, Show Some Love you Losers!), 2007 Ranbō to taiki (Vengeance Can Wait), 2010 Ikiteru dake de, ai (Love at Least), 2018