See also 宮部 みゆき (Japanese language profile) and 宮部美幸 (Chinese language profile).
Miyuki Miyabe (宮部みゆき Miyabe Miyuki) is a popular contemporary Japanese author active in a number of genres including science fiction, mystery fiction, historical fiction, social commentary, and juvenile fiction. Miyabe started writing novels at the age of 23. She has been a prolific writer, publishing dozens of novels and winning many major literary prizes, including the Yamamoto Shūgorō Prize in 1993 for Kasha and the Naoki Prize in 1998 for Riyū [The Reason] (理由). A Japanese film adaptation of Riyû, directed by Nobuhiko Obayashi, was released in 2004.
Amazing read as always from Miyuki Miyabe. Her horror stories are always brilliant and nuanced, elegantly capturing the heart and soul of common folk during Edo period. Even her samurai characters are either retired or flawed in certain ways, eg a country bumpkin accent. There are no heroes in her stories, it's all regular folk with heartbreaking stories. She's such an excellent writer you end up empathising with the monster or ghost. It's because of human flaws - greed, jealousy, etc that morphs into evil after death. The dead have their stories too, and sometimes the living lie.