Tomato Soup is a Japanese manga artist and a graduate of Tama Art University. Her work focuses primarily on medieval and early modern world history; “Dampier no Oishii Boken” recounts the life and voyages of the seventeenth-century explorer William Dampier through food, natural history, and encounters with different cultures. Set in the thirteenth-century Mongol Empire, “Tenmaku no Jaadugar,” published in English as “A Witch’s Life in Mongol,” follows the Iranian captive Fatima as she uses her knowledge and intelligence to survive at the imperial court. The series topped the women’s list in “Kono Manga ga Sugoi! 2023” and has been selected for a television anime adaptation. Tomato Soup’s historically researched manga examines empire, trade, cultural exchange, and the lives of women often left at the margins of recorded history.
