Her father was the poet and critic Takaaki Yoshimoto, and her sister, Haruno Yoiko [ja], is a well-known cartoonist in Japan.

"[2] Yoshimoto keeps her personal life guarded and reveals little about her certified rolfing practitioner husband, Hiroyoshi Tahata, or son (born in 2003).

There have been two film adaptations: a Japanese TV movie[4] and a more widely released version titled Wo ai chu fang, produced in Hong Kong by Ho Yim in 1997.

[6] In 1988 (January), she also won the 16th Izumi Kyōka Prize for Literature, for the novella Moonlight Shadow, which is included in most editions of Kitchen.

[8] Her themes include love and friendship, the power of home and family, and the effect of loss on the human spirit.

[9][10] Yoshimoto says that her two main themes are "the exhaustion of young Japanese in contemporary Japan" and "the way in which terrible experiences shape a person's life".

She addresses readers in a personal and friendly way, with warmth and outright innocence, writing about the simple things such as the squeaking of wooden floors or the pleasant smell of food.

And in 2000, she received the 10th Bunkamura Deux Magots Literary Prize, for Furin to Nambei, a collection of stories set in South America.