Aki Asahina (1981–) is a Japanese novelist and physician. After graduating from Kyoto University Faculty of Medicine, Asahina began writing fiction while practicing as an internist. Drawing on firsthand experience in clinical medicine, the author's work explores illness, the body, family, and the boundary between life and death with psychological depth and meticulous observation. Asahina won the Hayashi Fumiko Literary Prize in 2021 for "Shio no Michi," and "Shokubutsu Shōjo" ("Plant Girl") was shortlisted for the Akutagawa Prize in 2023. In 2024, "Sanshōuo no Shijūkunichi" ("The Salamander's Forty-Nine Days") received the 171st Akutagawa Prize, further establishing Asahina as a distinctive voice in contemporary Japanese literature.