Naoki Prize
In 1981 and in 1982, he was recommended for the Naoki Prize for novels based on his travels. In 1983, his novel, "Tenzan o koete" (“Crossing the Tenzan Mountains”), set in Dairen and Manchukuo won the Mystery Writers of Japan Award. In 1983, he was awarded the prestigious Naoki Prize for his story "Kuro Pan Furyoki" (“Chronicle of the Brown Bread Prisoners”) about the suffering of a Japanese prisoner of war in Siberia after World War II.