Miyabe's novel All She Was Worth (火車, Kasha), set at the beginning of Japan's lost decade and telling the story of a Tokyo police inspector's search for a missing woman who might be an identity thief trying to get clear of debt, was published by Futabasha in 1992.
The next year Kasha won the Yamamoto Shūgorō Prize, which is awarded for a new literary work that excels at storytelling in any genre.
[11] Marilyn Stasio of The New York Times positively noted the relationship between the "spare style and measured pace" of Birnbaum's translation and the "somber tone of Miyuki's theme" of individual value in a consumerist economy,[12] while Cameron Barr of The Christian Science Monitor wrote that the book's treatment of privacy and data tracking would leave the impression that "personal privacy is a rickety antique.
[14] Riyū won the 17th Japan Adventure Fiction Association Prize in the Japanese novel category that same year.
"[17] Riyū was adapted into a Nobuhiko Obayashi movie that was first shown on the Wowow television channel before its 2004 theatrical release.
[18] Miyabe's novel Crossfire (クロスファイア, Kurosufaia), about a police detective pursuing a girl with pyrokinetic powers, was published in the same year as Riyū.