Akiko Hatsu

Who is Akiko Hatsu?

Akiko Hatsu is a Japanese manga artist born on December 16, 1959, in Kanazawa, Ishikawa Prefecture, Japan. From the time she was in high school, she assisted her older sister, professional manga artist Yukiko Kai. After graduating high school, she began working for a printing company in Kanazawa City, but she soon quit in order to become a full-time assistant to her sister. She also began to assist other professional artists, most notably Moto Hagio.

Throughout this period, Hatsu was creating self-published manga with her friend Yasuko Sakata, and sometime around 1980, the two of them coined the term yaoi. In 1980, Yukiko Kai died of stomach cancer at the age of 26. The following year, Hatsu made her professional debut in the magazine ALLAN with the short story "Elegy of the Waves".

Her work has been published in numerous magazines, including DUO, Grapefruit, Petit Flower, Strange Stories for Sleepless Nights. Hatsu served as an adjunct instructor at Kyoto Seika University until retiring in 2005 due to health issues.