Nnedi Okorafor

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Nnedi Okorafor

Nnedi Okorafor (born April 8, 1974 in Cincinnati , Ohio ) is a Nigerian-American writer and professor of creative writing at the University of Buffalo . Her publications belong to the genres science fiction , fantasy and afrofuturism .

biography

Okorafor was born in 1974 to Nigerian parents who emigrated to the United States in 1969. Okorafor studied rhetoric at the University of Illinois (BA 1996) and earned an MA in journalism ( Michigan State University , 1999) and in English literature ( University of Chicago , 2002). In 2001 she was a participant in the renowned Clarion workshop for budding science fiction and fantasy authors. She also completed her doctorate in 2007 at the University of Chicago. Her first short story, "The Palm Tree Bandit" was published in 2000. Other short stories followed in anthologies. Okorafor teaches as an Associate Professor at the University of Chicago and Governors State University . She lives in New York and Illinois and has one daughter.

Work and reception

Okorafor's works are shaped by the connection between social utopia or post-apocalypse with Afro-futuristic visions and post-colonial criticism, but also tie in with West African mythology, in particular with cosmology and the social and spiritual traditions of the Igbo . Okorafor's central motivation is that she sees African perspectives, or the specific perspective of African diaspora, as insufficiently represented in science fiction literature.

Okorafor received the 2001 Hurston-Wright Literature Prize for her short story "Amphibious Green". She then published two books for young people, Zahrah the Windseeker (2005, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt ) and The Shadow Speaker (2007, Hyperion / Disney). For the former, she received the Wole Soyinka Prize for Literature in Africa . Even Shadow Speaker won several awards, u. a. the Carl Brandon Parallax Award , the Andre Norton Award, and the Golden Duck Award . Her first adult-readership novel, Who fears Death (2010, DAW / Penguin), received the 2011 World Fantasy Award for Best Novel. Her novel Lagoon (2014, Hodder & Stoughton Ltd.), who plays in Lagos , was nominated for the British Science Fiction Association Award and won the Red Tentacle Award .

Her most recent novel, Binti (2015, Tor.com), which deals with the Namibian Himba ethnicity and the admission of a Himba woman to an intergalactic university, won the Nebula Award as well as the Hugo Award in August 2016 and a Nommo Award in 2017 in the Best Novella category .

2019 it was included in the anthology New Daughters of Africa by Margaret Busby added.

Awards

  • 2005: The Strange Horizons Reader's Choice Award for Stephen King's Super-Duper Magical Negroes
  • 2007 - 2008: Macmillan Writers' Prize for Africa for Long Juju Man
  • 2008: Carl Brandon Parallax Award for The Shadow Speaker
  • 2008: The Wole Soyinka Prize for Literature for Zahrah the Windseeker
  • 2011: The World Fantasy Award (Best Novel) for Who Fears Death
  • 2012: The 2012 Black Excellence Award for Outstanding Achievement in Literature (Fiction) for Zahrah the Windseeker
  • 2012: Kindred Award for Who Fears Death
  • 2016: The Nebula Award (Best Novella) for Binti
  • 2016: Children's Africana Book Award for Best Book for Young Readers for Chicken in the Kitchen
  • 2016: Hugo Award for Binti as Best Novella
  • 2017: Nommo Award for Binti as Best Novella
  • 2018: Kurd-Laßwitz Prize for The Book of the Phoenix
  • 2018: Locus Award for Akata Warrior as Best Young Adult Book

Works

Young people's book - written under the name Nnedi Okorafor-Mbachu

  • Zahrah the Windseeker (2005, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt ; Paperback 2008, Graphia / Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)
  • The Shadow Speaker (2007, Hyperion / Disney)

Children's book - written under the name Nnedi Okorafor

  • Long Juju Man (2009, Macmillan Africa)
  • Iridessa and the Secret of the Never Mine (2012, Disney Books)

Youth book - written under the name Nnedi Okorafor

  • Akata Witch (2011, Viking / Penguin) (published as What Sunny Saw in the Flames in Nigeria and in Great Britain by Cassava Republic )
  • Akata Witch 2: Akata Warrior (2017, Viking / Penguin / PRH) (published as Sunny and the Mysteries of Osisi in Nigeria and in Great Britain by Cassava Republic)

Fiction - written under the name Nnedi Okorafor

  • Who Fears Death (2010, DAW / Penguin); German as Who fears death (2017, Cross Cult ) ISBN 978-3-95981-186-6
  • "Hello, Moto" (2011, A Tor.Com Original short story)
  • "Moom!" Short story, published in AfroSF: Science Fiction by African Writers (2012, Storytime)
  • Kabu Kabu (2013, Prime Books)
  • Lagoon (2014, Hodder & Stoughton Ltd.) (2015, Saga Press / Simon & Schuster); German as Lagune (2016, Cross Cult) ISBN 978-3-86425-873-2
  • The Book of Phoenix (2015, DAW / Penguin / PRH ) (prequel of Who Fears Death ); German as Das Buch des Phönix (October 2017, Cross Cult) ISBN 978-3-95981-493-5
  • Binti (2015, Tor.com) German as Binti 1: alone (2017, Cross Cult) ISBN 978-3-95981-653-3
  • Binti 2: Home (2017, Tor.com) German as Binti 2: Heimat (2017, Cross Cult) ISBN 978-3-95981-655-7
  • Binti 3: The Night Masquerade (2018, Tor.com) German as Binti 3: Nachtmaskerade (2018, Cross Cult) ISBN 978-3-95981-656-4

Web links

Commons : Nnedi Okorafor  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Nnedi Okorafor: The Palm Tree Bandit. In: Strange Horizons. December 11, 2000, accessed August 18, 2017 .
  2. ^ Susan Marie Groppi: Reader's Choice Awards. In: strangehorizons.com. March 28, 2005, accessed June 23, 2018 .
  3. ↑ Nnedi Okorafor, Macmillan. In: US Macmillan. Retrieved November 17, 2017 (American English).
  4. ↑ a b c sfadb: Nnedi Okorafor Awards . Retrieved November 17, 2017.
  5. ↑ Sam Jordison: A Nobel example for our books prize judges (en-GB) . In: The Guardian , November 12, 2008. Retrieved November 17, 2017. 
  6. ↑ Nnedi Okorafor: Zahrah the Windseeker - Nnedi Okorafor ( s ) Accessed November 17, 2017th
  7. ↑ 2015 Nebula Awards Nominees Announced . February 20, 2016. Retrieved November 17, 2017.
  8. ↑ Nnedi Okorafor: Chicken in the Kitchen - Nnedi Okorafor . Retrieved November 17, 2017.
  9. ↑ 2016 Hugo Awards Announced (en-US) . In: The Hugo Awards , August 21, 2016. Retrieved November 17, 2017. 
  10. ↑ locusmag: 2017 Nommo Awards Winners. In: Locus Online. November 16, 2017. Retrieved November 1, 2019 (American English).
  11. ↑ 2018 Kurd Lasswitz Price
  12. ↑ Ivor W. Hartmann: AfroSF: Science Fiction by African Writers. StoryTime 2012


personal data
SURNAME Okorafor, Nnedi
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Nigerian-American science fiction author
DATE OF BIRTH April 8, 1974
PLACE OF BIRTH Cincinnati