有川 ひろ（ありかわ ひろ）は、SF的な設定や仕事の現場を背景に、人と人との関係を描く小説家。高知県生まれ。旧筆名は有川 浩。2003年に『塩の街 wish on my precious』で第10回電撃小説大賞の大賞を受賞し、翌年に同作でデビューした。人間が塩に変わる異変のなかで出会った人々を描くこの作品から、自衛隊の活動を物語に取り込む執筆を始めた。2006年に刊行を開始した『図書館戦争』シリーズでは、出版物への検閲が行われる社会を舞台に、本を守る図書隊に入った笠原 郁の成長や恋愛を描いた。読む自由をめぐる対立と隊員たちの日常を重ねた同シリーズは、2008年に第39回星雲賞日本長編部門を受賞した。その後は職場や地域、家族の関係を扱う小説にも活動を広げた。2012年の『旅猫リポート』（英題 “The Travelling Cat Chronicles”）では、青年サトルと猫のナナが、かつての友人たちを訪ねて各地を旅する過程を描き、再会を通じてサトルの過去と人々のつながりをたどった。同作は英訳され、2018年には映画化された。2019年2月に筆名の表記を有川 浩から有川 ひろへ改めた。
Hiro Arikawa is a Japanese novelist whose fiction explores relationships against settings that range from speculative crises to working life. Born in Kochi Prefecture, she formerly published her name using the kanji 有川浩. In 2003, “Shio no Machi: Wish on My Precious” won the grand prize in the tenth Dengeki Novel Prize, and its publication the following year marked her debut. Depicting people brought together during a crisis in which humans turn into salt, it introduced her use of the Self-Defense Forces within speculative fiction. Beginning in 2006, her “Toshokan Senso” (Library Wars) series followed Iku Kasahara as she joined a library defence force in a society that censored publications. Combining conflicts over the freedom to read with the recruits’ daily lives, personal growth, and romance, the series received the Japanese long fiction award at the 2008 Seiun Awards. Her subsequent fiction also explored workplaces, communities, and families. In the 2012 novel “Tabineko Report,” published in English as “The Travelling Cat Chronicles,” the young man Satoru and his cat Nana visited friends from his past. Their journey gradually revealed his history and the relationships connecting the people they met. The novel was translated into English and adapted into a film in 2018. In February 2019, she changed the written form of her pen name from 有川浩 to 有川ひろ.
