Nnedi Okorafor’s Inspiring Storytelling Origins Inspires Ake Festival Guests at Prelude Event

Nnedi Okorafor found the calling to be a writer of the spectacular and the fantastic after she wrote her first ever story in the pages of a gifted copy of Isaac Asimov’s I, Robot

On a tranquil evening on November 20th, 2024, Dr. Nnedi Okorafor was warmly greeted by guests of Ake Arts and Book Festival at the hosting American Consulate in Lagos State, Nigeria.

With parts effusive, parts eccentric Lola Shoneyin, festival convener, doing the probing, a diverse audience of writers, journalists, publishing, and creative professionals listened raptly as the renowned afrojujuism writer lay bare the deep and impactful experiences that shaped the start of her blockbuster writing career.

Strong beginnings

Nnedi described how she started writing as “not normal.”

Born to parents who were both professional athletes, Nnedi was destined to blaze the same path. Thanks to her unique biological heritage, she played semi-pro tennis from the age of 9 and dominated several track and field events in her early years.

However, fear and dread reared twin heads as, aged 13, she faced down the barrel of a life-changing medical diagnosis.

“I was diagnosed with scoliosis which is the curvature of the spine. This did not affect my athletics at all, and might have even made me perform better, ionno“, Nnedi said.

However, at 19, tragedy struck. At the end of her senior year, while at the peak of her physical powers, playing on the tennis team at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaigne, an x-ray scan found that her spine curvature had become severe. Medically advised to opt for corrective surgery or be crippled by 25, she chose the former.

Eight hours after the surgery, Nnedi woke to an altered earthly cloak- paralyzed from the waist down, with no medical knowledge able to proffer an explanation for its occurrence.

“I could feel my mind breaking. I knew that if I did not do something, I would just lose my mind. There was no way that this was happening to me. I couldn’t understand it, couldn’t process it, it was a dark place. I remember I kept spraying perfumes on the walls because I just felt like something was closing in on me, something that did not smell good.”

Snatched from her old life and facing her new reality, Nnedi Okorafor found the calling to be a writer of the spectacular and the fantastic after she wrote her first ever story in the pages of a gifted copy of Isaac Asimov’s I, Robot, a few days post-surgery, as the start of her journey out of darkness and into healing.

On Afro-Futurism, African Futurism and African Jujuism

Despite having authored over 20 books, Nnedi Okorofor continues to be at the center of literary schisms with Black American and Afro audiences who “gatekeep” Afro-Futurism to the exclusion of the imposing and lofty-loc-ed author- herself the daughter of Nigerian immigrants.

“More like Ben Okri than Octavia Butler,” Nnedi Okorafor describes herself.

As such, she claims to write African Futurism and African Jujuism, respective equivalents of mainstream Science Fiction and Fantasy, to show that Black Speculative Fiction isn’t coming from the same source.

New Deals, Ouida Publishing, and Upcoming Release

After signing a seven-figure deal with HarperCollins imprint William Morrow for her upcoming novel titled The Africanfuturist, Nnedi Okorafor is focusing on firmly establishing her roots with a collaboration with renowned artist and creative Abdulkareem Baba Aminu, yielding a stunning cover for the newly released Nigerian edition of her novella She Who Knows (Ouida)

Death of the Author (January 2025), the author’s latest release, written on the heels of the passing of her sister Ngozi in 2021, may yet reveal more layers of Nnedi for readers digest.