Saki Kawashiro was born in Tokyo, Japan. An avid reader, she worked as a bookseller in Fukuoka, in Southern Japan, after graduating from college. While managing the store's café, she created a dish for the menu-"My Ex-Boyfriend's Favorite Butter Chicken Curry"-which included a vignette about their breakup and quickly went viral. Toshikazu Kawaguchi, author of Before the Coffee Gets Cold, visited Saki's bookstore with his editor. The editor encouraged Saki to write a novel about her experiences-which became The Ex-Boyfriend's Favorite Recipe Funeral Committee, Saki's first novel.

Yuka Maeno is a translator, editor, and subtitler working in English and Japanese. Her Japanese to English literary translations include The Vanishing Cherry Blossom Bookshop by Takuya Asakura. Originally from Nagoya, Japan, she currently lives in Bray, Ireland.