Despite the success of her business, she closed the shop to attend Gakushuuin Women's Junior College, where she studied literature and edited the student literary magazine.

[1] Tsumura was nominated for the Naoki Prize in 1959 for her short story, "Kagi" (Key), which she wrote for Bungakukai magazine.

In 1972, Tsumura's short story, "Saihate" (The Farthest Limit) won the Shincho Prize.

It is included in the anthology This Kind of Woman: Ten Stories by Japanese Women Writers by Elizabeth Hanson and Yukiko Tanaka.

[5][1] "Gangu," the short story that won Tsumura the Akutagawa Prize, was translated by Kyoko Evanhoe and Robert N. Lawson for the Japan Quarterly in 1980 under the name "Playthings.