Reading List
Authors Like
Mieko Kawakami grew up in Osaka, raised by a single mother in poverty. She started work in a factory at 14, and in her early twenties was a bar hostess and a bookshop clerk. She released three J-pop albums, wrote a blog called ‘Critique of Pure Sadness’ that drew more than 200,000 hits a day at its peak, and won the Akutagawa Prize for the novella Chichi to Ran. She rewrote it as Breasts and Eggs (2019), with its dialogue in Osaka dialect: Makiko comes to Tokyo looking for an affordable breast operation, and her daughter Midoriko has stopped speaking. In Heaven (2009) a 14-year-old boy with a wandering eye is bullied in 1991, and Sisters in Yellow, published in English in March 2026, follows a teenage girl in late-1990s Tokyo into a bar called Lemon. The ten writers below share her subjects: bodies, money and the women who make do.
By Lisanne Swart · 10 authors · Japanese fiction · Women, bodies and class · Updated October 2026
Quick answer
If you love Mieko Kawakami, start with Yūko Tsushima, whose Territory of Light (1979) draws on her life as a single mother in Tokyo. Sayaka Murata’s Convenience Store Woman (2016) asks the same questions about what women owe society, and Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan novels share her working-class city, its dialect, and women bound by family and need. Further down is the famous Japanese novelist she questioned in public about how he writes women.
10 authors like Mieko Kawakami
Where to start if you loved Mieko Kawakami
If you want the same Tokyo poverty, read Natsuo Kirino.
Out follows night-shift factory workers into crime; read it after Sisters in Yellow.
If you want the single mother, read Yūko Tsushima.
Territory of Light is short and was first published in Japanese in 1979.
If you want the same questions as satire, read Sayaka Murata.
Convenience Store Woman is the quickest way in.
If you want the argument with Murakami, read Norwegian Wood.
It is his breakthrough novel and a clear view of the kind of female character Kawakami has questioned him about.
If you want more Kawakami, start with Breasts and Eggs.
Then read Heaven (2009), All the Lovers in the Night (2011) and Sisters in Yellow (English 2026).
Frequently asked questions about authors like Mieko Kawakami
Who writes like Mieko Kawakami?
Yūko Tsushima, Sayaka Murata and Elena Ferrante are the closest: Tsushima for single motherhood in Tokyo, Murata for women under social pressure, Ferrante for women and poverty in a dialect-speaking city. Natsuo Kirino is the match for Sisters in Yellow.
What should I read after Breasts and Eggs?
Try Sheila Heti’s Motherhood (2018), about deciding whether to have a child, or Yūko Tsushima’s Territory of Light (1979), about raising one alone.
Is Mieko Kawakami like Sayaka Murata?
Both are Japanese women writing about bodies, marriage and having children, and both won the Akutagawa Prize. Murata writes deadpan satire; Kawakami writes long, realist novels.
Does Mieko Kawakami have a new book?
Sisters in Yellow, translated by Laurel Taylor and Hitomi Yoshio, was published in English by Knopf in March 2026. A film of All the Lovers in the Night, directed by Yukiko Sode, was screened at Cannes in 2026.
Which Mieko Kawakami book should I read first?
Start with Breasts and Eggs, her best-known novel in English; Ms Ice Sandwich is a much shorter alternative.
What is Heaven by Mieko Kawakami about?
A 14-year-old boy with a wandering eye and a girl in his class, both bullied, in 1991. It was shortlisted for the International Booker Prize in 2022.
Sources
- Mieko Kawakami — Wikipedia
- Breasts and Eggs — Europa Editions
- Sisters in Yellow — Kirkus Reviews
- Heaven (Kawakami novel) — Wikipedia
List last reviewed 31 October 2026.
Read next
