Japanese Literary Awards

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Yoshikawa Eiji Literary Newcomer Award よしかわえいじぶんがくしんじんしょう

Edition 42 (2021)

Literary award

Winners

6 people
Shigeaki Kato かとう しげあき award

A coming-of-age novel set in a world where a high-school-only matching app has become part of society, following the wavering choices of three teenagers.

Love, future plans, and a place to belong quietly shift within the app-driven system.

384 pages
coming of agehigh schoolSNSmatching appcontemporary fiction
Ayano Takeda たけだ あやの award

A coming-of-age novel in which students trapped by abusive parents and poverty support one another while still carrying the burden of not fully understanding each other.

A quiet story of resistance and solidarity that does not assume love as a given.

320 pages
abusive parentspovertyfriendshipuniversity studentssisterhood
You Ashizawa あしざわ ひさし nominee

A short-story collection in which tiny frays in everyday life turn into cracks in relationships and guilt across each piece.

The stains you overlook quietly come back to your hands.

240 pages
mysteryshort storieseveryday uneaseguiltrelationships
Yume Tsujido つじどう ゆめ nominee

A family novel that spans the Tokyo Olympics of 1964 and 2020, tracing the secrets of a mother, her son, and three generations.

Two Olympic eras reconnect family silence and the struggle to live.

358 pages
familyTokyo Olympicsthree generationssecretsepic novel
Haruna Terachi てらち はるな nominee

A story in which Kiyosumi, a high school boy who loves sewing, tries to make a wedding dress for his sister and ends up questioning what is considered “normal” in family and gender.

With needle and thread, he resews the outline of family and the outline of himself.

264 pages
familygendersewinghigh schoolself-expression
Mado Nozaki のざき まど nominee

A science-fiction novel set in a future society ruled by the supreme AI Titan, where the human beings asked to do a job are forced to reconsider what work means.

In a world where work has been lost, it asks what should be entrusted anew.

384 pages
science fictionAIworkfuture societynovel