Mineo Maya is a Japanese manga artist born on March 4, 1953, in Niigata City, Japan. He made his professional debut in 1973 with the one-shot story Mishiranu hōmon-sha, published in the shōjo magazine Bessatsu Margaret. Maya is best known as the creator of the long-running comedy manga series Patalliro!, which began serialization in 1978 in the magazine Hana to Yume. The series follows the adventures of the mischievous, ten-year-old King Patalliro VIII of the fictional diamond-rich nation of Malynera and his handsome British MI6 bodyguard, Major Jack Bancoran. With over 100 volumes published, Patalliro! is recognized as one of the longest-running and best-selling shōjo manga series of all time.

The popularity of Patalliro! led to multiple anime adaptations. In 1982, a 49-episode television anime series titled Boku Patalliro! was produced by Toei Animation and broadcast on Fuji TV. The following year, in 1983, a theatrical film titled Patalliro! Stardust Project (also known as Patalliro! Stardust Keikaku) was released. Maya is credited as the original creator and writer for this film, in which he also made a cameo voice appearance. Beyond the original series, Maya created a spin-off manga titled Patalliro Saiyūki!, a comedic reimagining of the classic Chinese tale Journey to the West featuring characters from Patalliro!. This spin-off was itself adapted into an anime television series that aired in 2005.

Maya’s artistic identity is defined by a distinctive blend of absurdist comedy, fantasy adventure, and pioneering explorations of shōnen-ai, or boys' love, themes. His art style is noted for its exaggerated, non-traditional character designs, most famously the two-head-tall, cat-like King Patalliro. The 1982 Patalliro! anime is recognized as the first television anime to explicitly depict homosexuality, marking a significant moment in the medium's history. In addition to the Patalliro! franchise, Maya is the author of other notable works, including the satirical comedy Tonde Saitama, which was adapted into a successful live-action film in 2019. His contributions to manga have been formally acknowledged with a nomination for the Seiun Award in 1981 and the receipt of the Japan Cartoonists Association Award in 1999 for the Patalliro! series.