Taro Yamanobe (born 1975) is a Japanese novelist from Fukushima Prefecture who grew up in Miyagi. He studied German literature at the University of Tokyo and completed a master’s degree there. He made his literary debut after winning the 55th Bungei Prize in 2018 for "Itsuka Fukai Ana ni Ochiru Made." The novel follows an office worker involved in a secret postwar project to dig a tunnel straight through the Earth connecting Japan and Brazil. Spanning decades as the seemingly impossible undertaking passes from one generation to another, the story combines an absurdly ambitious idea with the realities of postwar Japanese history and corporate life, portraying with humor and melancholy the ordinary people who devote their lives to an extraordinary goal.
