Honoka was born in
Kagoshima Prefecture, Japan. She is a
licensed practical nurse and has appeared as a
race queen at the 2004 Suzuka 8 Hours endurance race (July 2004). She plays the guitar, enjoys swimming and volleyball, going to
Kabuki theatre and walking her dog. Like fellow
AV Idols
Sora Aoi and
Nana Natsume, she has been able to combine a career as an AV actress with mainstream movie and TV appearances. Before she started in AV, Honoka had a small role as a
Gynoid secretary in the
TV Tokyo cosplay drama
The Ultimate Venus Angel Healing Force (究極癒し戦隊ヴィーナスエンジェル) which she was in from February 16 to March 29, 2004.
AV actress Honoka began her adult video career in June 2004 with
Bud for the
Try-Heart Corporation on their Sexia label. She made several more videos with Try-Heart over the next 18 months and in March 2006, she starred in videos for two new AV studios,
Sell Debut x Risky Mosaic, directed by
Hideto Aki, at
S1 No. 1 Style and
Deep Impact - Honoka Sell Debut for the Premium Glamour label. She continued working with the two studios, usually appearing in one video every alternating month for each studio. Her last original work with S1 was released in January 2008, but she continued to make films with Premium until her retirement. During Honoka's AV career, she worked for studios which specialized in softer, more glamour-oriented types of pornography, She was also the recipient of the "Best Actress" prize at the 2007
Adult Broadcasting Awards for the 2006 broadcast year. After pressing her tongue against the phallus-shaped prize statuette, she declared "I never thought I would be selected. I'd like to say that it was 'my pleasure' to my fans." In closing, she added "I want to be more famous in the AV field" and "I also want to encourage other girls to strive to be the best. Honoka was again honored by fans by winning the Best Actress award in the 2006
AV Actress Grand Prix. Another of her S1 videos,
Hyper Risky Mosaic - Special Bath House Tsubaki (ハイパーギリギリモザイク 特殊浴場 TSUBAKI 貸切入浴料1億円), with 11 other S1 actresses was the First Place winning entry in the 2007
AV Open contest. Honoka announced in her Official Blog that she was retiring in December 2008 and that her December 7, 2008 video for Premium,
Pleasures of Education, would be her last. She participated in one final event for Premium by making a round of publicity appearances at Tokyo shops on December 20, 2008. She has continued to keep her blog open. In 2012, the major Japanese adult video distributor
DMM held a poll of its customers to choose the 100 all time best AV actresses to celebrate the 30th anniversary of adult videos in Japan. Honoka finished in 37th place in the balloting.
TV appearances Honoka was in the
J-dorama Shimokita GLORY DAYS (下北GLORY DAYS) along with fellow S1 actresses
Sora Aoi and
Yuma Asami and singer-actress
Aya Sugimoto. The 12-week series aired on
TV Tokyo beginning in April 2006. She played the character
Nishina Natsume in the series which is based on the
manga of the same name and revolves about a
ronin student moving to Tokyo and sharing a house with several beautiful women. She was also in the TV romantic comedy
Cupid no Itazura (クピドの悪戯) on
TV Tokyo which ran for 11 weeks beginning October 13, 2006 and concerned a young man with the rare disease of "rainbow balls" which limits the number of times he can have sex in his life. In addition, Honoka played the character of Keiko in the third episode ("OL Manager") of the
Fuji TV drama ''Unusual Story Fall '06 Special Edition'' (世にも奇妙な物語 '06秋の特別編) on October 2, 2006. In late 2009, she made a guest appearance in the first season of the television series
The Ancient Dogoo Girl, a comic
tokusatsu show directed by
Noboru Iguchi. She has also appeared as a guest on a number of TV variety shows. A 2nd season was announced in January 2013, and debuted April 5, 2013 with Honoka returning as Malseena.
Film appearances In addition to several softcore
V-Cinema videos, Honoka has also been featured in mainstream movies. She starred in award-winning director Toru Kamei's film based on the
manga of the same name by
Naoki Yamamoto. The film was first released June 9, 2007 at a late show at the Pole Pole cinema in Higashi-Nakano and later (July 25, 2007) as a DVD. She also had a major role in
Noboru Iguchi's over-the-top action-horror gorefest
The Machine Girl which premiered at the
Yubari International Fantastic Film Festival on March 22, 2008, and was released as a DVD on June 3, 2008. Honoka also had a role in the June 2008 theatrical drama directed by Hideyuki Katsuki. The film, fifth in the
Dekotora no shu series, starred
Show Aikawa and also featured
pink film actress
Junko Miyashita and AV actress
Maria Yumeno. Honoka continued her mainstream film career in 2009 by starring in the Tōru Kamei directed drama which premiered at the Tsutaya theatre in
Shibuya, Tokyo on December 15, 2009 and was released as a DVD on January 22, 2010, by AMG. In 2012, she starred in director Junpei Matsumoto's debut film, , a drama of disaffected youth in Tokyo, which reached theaters in May 2012. In his review of the film, critic Mark Schilling calls her acting surprising for a former AV actress, characterizing her performance as "committed, if slightly awkward." In October 2012 she played the part of Eleena in the action movie , commemorating the thirtieth anniversary of the
Space Sheriff Gavan TV series. In 2013, she was cast as Sakura in the
manga-based thrillers
Tokyo Yamimushi Parts I and II, directed by
Sakichi Sato. Both films were released on September 28, 2013.
Literary activities Honoka authored two books in 2009,
Little Sex Devil (), on sex and sexuality for publisher Best Sellers (), in January 2009 (), and
Pleasures of the Body, Shape of Love (), five short stories about "men and women" published by
Futabasha () in July 2009 (). On January 18, 2010, she released an autobiographical work,
Kago Biography of Honoka: Mama, I Love You (). The book, published by Shufunotomo (), gives an account of her childhood which involved kidnappers, and sexual and physical abuse. She says she was tricked into her AV debut, thinking she was going to make a CD. Honoka's book is one of a number of memoirs by actresses about the AV industry harking back to
Ai Iijima's semi-autobiographical novel
Platonic Sex in 2000, and including
Mihiro's partially fictionalized autobiography
nude from 2009 and
Saori Hara's
My Real Name Is Mai Kato: Why I Became an AV Actress from December 2009, which adult media reporter Rio Yasuda sees as marking a trend in which the AV industry is being assimilated into popular culture. == Bibliography ==