

Onda made her literary debut in 1992 with the novel Rokubanme no Sayoko ( 六番目の小夜子, The Sixth Sayoko), which was adapted into the 2000 NHK show Rokubanme no Sayoko ( 六番目の小夜子, Sayoko is Back) starring Anne Suzuki and Chiaki Kuriyama. She graduated from Waseda University in 1987 and worked in an office for several years, then quit her job to try writing a novel after reading Ken'ichi Sakemi's 1991 novel Kōkyū shōsetsu ( 後宮小說). Onda was born in 1964 in Aomori, Japan but raised in Sendai in Miyagi Prefecture.

Her work has been adapted for film and television.

Onda has won the Yoshikawa Eiji Prize for New Writers, the Japan Booksellers' Award, the Mystery Writers of Japan Award for Best Novel, the Yamamoto Shūgorō Prize, and the Naoki Prize. Riku Onda ( 恩田 陸, Onda Riku) is the professional name of Nanae Kumagai ( 熊谷 奈苗, Kumagai Nanae, born 1964), a Japanese writer.
