Izumi KIZARA is the joint pen name of Tsutomu Izumi (b. 1952-) and his wife Tokiko Mega (b. 1957-). Izumi was a stand-up comedy writer, and Mega wrote scripts for radio plays, before they joined forces to write the television drama Suika (Watermelon) in 2003 and won the Mukoda Kuniko Prize, awarded for excellence in scriptwriting. In the years since, they have produced a succession of hit television dramas and received numerous additional awards. In 2013 they collaborated on their first novel, Last Night’s Curry, Tomorrow’s Bread, which became a bestseller; it was voted runner-up for the Booksellers Award, and has been named a finalist for the Yamamoto Shugoro Prize.