Japanese children's book author Nahoko Uehashi has received the 2014 Hans Christian Andersen Author Award, the highest international recognition given to authors and illustrators of children's books.

The International Board on Books for Young People (IBBY) decided on the winner of the award, also known as "the Little Nobel Prize," during a meeting Wednesday in Mexico City.

"Uehashi conceives worlds in which relationships exist among different planes: worlds seen as a network within the universe rather than merely as a space," IBBY said in a statement.