Kaoru Kitamura (born 1949) is a Japanese novelist from Saitama Prefecture. A graduate of Waseda University, he worked as a high-school Japanese teacher before making his literary debut in 1989 with “Soratobu Uma” (The Flying Horse). It introduced his Enshi and I series, in which a female university student and a rakugo storyteller investigate puzzles arising from everyday life. Kitamura uses careful reasoning to uncover the emotions and personal circumstances behind seemingly minor incidents. He won the Naoki Prize in 2009 for “Sagi to Yuki” (Heron and Snow), a linked collection set in early Showa-era Tokyo. Its protagonists, schoolgirl Eiko Hanamura and her female chauffeur, known as Becky, investigate disappearances and other puzzling events within their privileged social world. Combining literary references with detection, the collection follows Eiko’s growing understanding of others while revealing the political unease gathering beyond her daily life.
