First Love and Beyond: Author SHIMAMOTO Rio on Japanese Romance Fiction

Dive into the world of romance and storytelling with SHIMAMOTO Rio, the celebrated Naoki Prize-winning author renowned for her masterful romance novels. Now that her award-winning novel First Love has been translated into English by Louise Heal Kawai for the first time, she will share insights into her creative process, writing journey, and the allure of Japanese romance fiction.

Moderating the conversation will be Leslie Shimotakahara, award-winning Canadian author, adding her own literary perspective to this unforgettable dialogue.

*The event will be held in English, with English-Japanese interpretation provided by Jocelyne Allen.

*RSVP Required – This event will be exclusively livestreamed on the Japan Foundation, Toronto’s official YouTube channel. Viewers can submit questions to the guest author via YouTube live chats. Register below to receive the streaming URL.

(c) Daisuke Hayata

Guest Author

RIO SHIMAMOTO (島本 理生) was born in Tokyo in 1983. In 2001, she won the 44th Gunzo New Writers’ Prize for Silhouette, and in 2003, she won the 25th Noma Literary New Face Prize for Little by Little. In 2015, she received the 21st Shimasei Renai Literature Award for Red and the 159th Naoki Prize for First Love in 2018.

Moderator

Leslie Shimotakahara‘s memoir, The Reading List, won the Canada-Japan Literary Prize and has been recently translated into Japanese. She has written three other critically acclaimed novels, After the Bloom, Red Oblivion, and Sisters of the Spruce. She completed a PhD in English at Brown University, after which she returned to her hometown of Toronto, where she now resides with her husband. Her fourth novel, The Breakwater, is forthcoming from Cormorant Books.

ABOUT THE BOOK

First Love

(The original Japanese version:『ファーストラヴ』)

Written by SHIMAMOTO Rio

Translated by Louise Heal Kawai

Published by Honford Star, 2024

Upon being arrested for the gruesome murder of her father, all college student Kanna Hijiriyama tells the police is “It’s up to you to find the motive.” Amidst the media frenzy about the woman “too beautiful to be a killer,” clinical psychologist Yuki Makabe is asked by Kanna’s lawyer to counsel the young woman as her trial approaches. Yuki slowly uncovers the dark history behind the relationships in Kanna’s life – with her father, her mother, and her “first love” – and discovers shocking inconsistencies in Kanna’s defense.

Winner of the prestigious Naoki Prize and a Japanese bestseller, First Love is part psychological drama, part legal thriller.

— from Publisher’s website

Related programming:

JFT Book Club (Hybrid) – First Love by SHIMAMOTO Rio

Saturday, February 8, 5:00 PM – 6:30 PM (EST)

For the upcoming JFT Book Club (Hybrid), we will discuss SHIMAMOTO Rio’s novel: First Love (the original Japanese version: 島本理生著『ファーストラヴ』). Join us in person or virtually to unravel the complexities of love, family, and hidden truths in this Naoki-award-winning mystery novel!

Details Here

The Nighthawk’s First Love

Tuesday, February 11, 6:00PM (ET)

Join us for our Valentine’s film screening of The Nighthawk’s First Love (よだかの片想い), adapted from the novel of the same name from acclaimed romance author SHIMAMOTO Rio. The film follows graduate student Aiko who always had low self-esteem because of the birthmark on the left side of her face. When her story becomes part of a book, and then adapted into a movie, she falls for the director who accepts her as she is.

Details Here