Nahoko Uehashi


Nahoko Uehashi is a Japanese writer, primarily of fantasy books, for which she has won many awards.
Uehashi is also Professor of Ethnology at Kawamura Gakuen Women's University, having completed a PhD focusing on the Yamatji, an indigenous Australian people.

Achievements

Uehashi's career as a writer started in 1989. Her first book was The Sacred Tree. She then wrote the novel O God, Sleep Ye in The Forest of Moon. This novel received an award from the Japanese Association of Writers for Children, which made her one of the famous Japanese-fantasy authors.
In 1996, she published the first book of her Moribito series, in 2009. In 1999, Uehashi published the second book of the Moribito series, Guardian of the Darkness. With this novel she received the Japanese Association of Writers for Children's award. In 2002 The Guardian series won the Iwaya Sazanami literature award, and in 2003, Guardian of the God won another Japanese award from the Shogakukan publishing company. Then, in 2003, Uehashi wrote the novel Beyond the Fox Whistle, which received a Noma Children's Literature award. In 2006 she wrote the two volume The Beast Player, which she complemented with two more volumes in 2009.
Both ' and the first two volumes of The Beast Player have had anime adaptations, in 2007 and 2009, respectively. ' has also been made into a radio drama and The Beast Player'' into a manga.
For her "lasting contribution" as a children's writer, Uehashi won the biennial, international Hans Christian Andersen Award in 2014.
Announced late in March, it will be presented on 10 September at the annual conference of the International Board on Books for Young People in Mexico City.
According to the IBBY jury chaired by María Jesús Gil of Spain, "Uehashi tells stories that are replete with imagination, culture and the beauty of a sophisticated process and form. Her literary subjects are based on ancient Japanese mythology and science-fiction fantasy that are deeply rooted in human reality."

Works in English translation