Born in 1999, Rin Usami is a university student and writer. Her debut novel Kaka won the Bungei Prize and the Mishima Yukio Prize. Her second novel Oshi, Moyu / Idol, Burning won the prestigious Akutagawa Prize in 2020 and has become a phenomenon, selling over 500,000 copies in Japan alone. She lives in Japan.
Asa Yoneda is a literary translator based in Bristol, UK, whose work includes The Lonesome Bodybuilder by Yukiko Motoya and Dead-End Memories by Banana Yoshimoto.