Nnedi Okorafor facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Nnedi Okorafor
Okorafor in 2023
Born	Nnedimma Nkemdili Okorafor (1974-04-08) April 8, 1974 (age 51) Cincinnati, Ohio, U.S.
Occupation	Writer, professor
Nationality	Nigerian American
Education	University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign (BA) Michigan State University (MA) University of Illinois, Chicago (MA, PhD)
Genre	Science fiction, Africanfuturism Fantasy, Africanjujuism, Afro-Fantasy, Solarpunk
Notable awards	Wole Soyinka Prize for Literature in Africa The World Fantasy Award Nebula Award for Best Novella Hugo Award for Best Novella Eisner Award for Best Graphic Album — Reprint Lodestar Award Locus Award for Best Young Adult Novel Carl Brandon Parallax Award
Children	1

Nnedi Okorafor (born April 8, 1974) is a talented Nigerian American writer. She writes exciting science fiction and fantasy stories for both kids and adults. You might know her from her popular Binti Series or her novels like Who Fears Death and Remote Control. She has also written for comics and even movies!

Nnedi Okorafor's stories are part of what she calls Africanfuturism and Africanjujuism. These styles are deeply inspired by her background, being both Nigerian and American. She has won many important awards, including the Hugo Award, Nebula Award, and World Fantasy Award. In 2024, she was honored by the Museum of Pop Culture and joined the Science Fiction Hall of Fame.

About Nnedi Okorafor's Life

Nnedi Okorafor in 2017

Nnedi Okorafor was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1974. Her parents were Igbo Nigerians who came to America for school in 1969. They couldn't go back to Nigeria because of the Nigerian Civil War happening at the time. Nnedi has citizenship in both America and Nigeria.

She is the third of four children and grew up in Chicago, Illinois. Her family often visited Nigeria for holidays. Her first name, Nnedimma, means "mother is good" in the Igbo language.

When she was in high school, Nnedi was a great athlete in tennis and track. She was also very good at math and science. For a while, she even wanted to study insects!

At age 13, she found out she had scoliosis, a condition where the spine curves. When she was 19, she had surgery to fix her spine. A rare problem during the surgery caused her to become unable to move her legs.

While recovering, Nnedi started writing small stories in the margins of a science fiction book. This was her first time writing creatively. After a lot of physical therapy, she learned to walk again with a cane. She couldn't continue her sports career, but a friend suggested she try a creative writing class. By the end of that semester, she was writing her first novel.

Nnedi went to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign for her college degree. She then earned master's degrees from Michigan State University and the University of Illinois, Chicago, where she also got her PhD. She has taught at several universities, including Chicago State University and the State University of New York at Buffalo. Since 2021, she has been a professor at Arizona State University. Today, she lives in Phoenix, Arizona, with her family.

Nnedi Okorafor's Creative Works

Short Stories and Collections

Nnedi Okorafor won an award in 2001 for her short story "Amphibious Green." Her short stories have appeared in many books and magazines. In 2013, she released a collection of her stories called Kabu Kabu. This book included new stories and some that had been published before. The famous actress Whoopi Goldberg even wrote the introduction for it!

Novels and Novellas

Nnedi Okorafor signing books in 2024.

After her first award, Nnedi wrote two popular books for young adults: Zahrah the Windseeker and The Shadow Speaker. The Shadow Speaker won several awards and honors. Her children's book, Long Juju Man, won the Macmillan Writer's Prize for Africa in 2007–08.

Her first novel for adults, Who Fears Death, won the World Fantasy Award in 2011. The story before it, The Book of Phoenix, also won an award in Germany.

In 2011, she wrote Akata Witch for young adults, which was the first book in her Nsibidi Scripts Series. The next book in the series, Akata Warrior, won the Locus Award for Best Young Adult Book in 2018.

Nnedi's science fiction novel Lagoon was nominated for several awards.

The Binti trilogy started with the novella Binti in 2015. This was followed by Binti: Home (2017) and Binti: The Night Masquerade (2018). Binti won both the Nebula Award and Hugo Award in 2016! The other two Binti novellas were also nominated for the Hugo Award.

In 2016, a Nigerian bank worked with a publisher to give away 24,000 copies of Nnedi's novel Akata Witch in nine African countries.

Her middle grade novel Ikenga was nominated for an Edgar Award in 2020.

In January 2021, her science fiction novella Remote Control, which takes place in Ghana, was published. Her adult novel Noor, set in a future northern Nigeria, came out in November 2021.

In January 2022, Akata Woman, the third book in the Nsibidi Scripts Series, was released. After it came out, the series appeared on The New York Times Best Seller list.

In 2023, a special updated version of her novel The Shadow Speaker was published again as Shadow Speaker. A new book, Like Thunder, followed it.

Also in 2023, Nnedi announced a new series of novellas called She Who Knows. These stories will be about Najeeba, a character from her 2010 novel Who Fears Death. The first novella was released in August 2024.

Her newest novel, Death of the Author, was released in January 2025.

Stories Brought to Life: Adaptations

Many of Nnedi Okorafor's stories have been turned into films or TV shows!

In 2017, her short story "Hello, Moto" was made into a short film called Hello, Rain. The story is about a woman who mixes magic and technology to create special wigs. These wigs give her and her friends power to fight corruption, but things don't go as planned.

In 2017, it was announced that her novel Who Fears Death would become a TV series for HBO. George R. R. Martin, who produced Game of Thrones, is involved, and Nnedi helps as a consultant.

In 2019, Nnedi announced she would help write the movie script for Octavia Butler's book Wild Seed for Amazon Prime Video.

In 2020, she also started helping to write the script for her Binti trilogy to become a TV series for Hulu.

In 2024, a movie adaptation of her novel Lagoon began development at Amblin Entertainment.

Other Interesting Work

In 2005, Nnedi wrote her first play, Full Moon. A theater company in Chicago helped produce it.

Her writings and other materials are kept in a special collection at the Northern Illinois University Library.

Nnedi was a special guest at Detcon1 in 2014, a big science fiction convention that focused on young adult science fiction that year.

She gave a speech at the TEDGlobal conference in Arusha, Tanzania, in 2017.

In 2017, Nnedi started writing for Marvel's Black Panther comic book series. She also wrote a short comic called "Blessing in Disguise," inspired by the kidnapping of Nigerian girls in 2014. She continued to write for other Black Panther comics, including Wakanda Forever and a solo comic about Black Panther's sister, Shuri.

Her first non-fiction book, Broken Places & Outer Spaces, was published in 2019. It's about finding creativity in unexpected places.

Nnedi also wrote an essay for the 2019 book New Daughters of Africa.

In 2018, her comic book series LaGuardia was published. In 2020, the collected version of LaGuardia won an Eisner Award and a Hugo Award!

Nnedi Okorafor's Influences and Themes

Nnedi Okorafor's books and stories show both her West African background and her American life. She calls herself "Naijamerican" to show how important both parts of her heritage are. She explained that living between these two cultures helps her see things from different angles, which makes her stories unique.

She noticed that there wasn't much diversity in fantasy and science fiction. This inspired her to write stories set in Africa, featuring black characters in important roles. Nnedi says Nigeria is her "muse" because she is greatly influenced by Nigerian folklore and its rich myths and magic.

Her stories often explore big social issues like fairness, violence, and protecting the environment, but she tells these stories through the lens of fantasy.

Nnedi shares that her stories are always based on "the women and girls around me and also within myself." She believes her writing and being a mother are connected and help balance each other.

Since 2019, she has used the terms africanfuturism and africanjujuism to describe her work. She wrote an essay called "Defining Africanfuturism" to explain these terms in detail.

World Fantasy Award Discussion

When Nnedi won the World Fantasy Award in 2011, she wrote about her mixed feelings. The award statue was a silver bust of H. P. Lovecraft, a famous writer who also had racist views. Nnedi supported the idea of changing the award statue to honor Octavia Butler, another great science fiction writer. She felt it was important to acknowledge the history of literature, including the difficult parts, rather than ignoring them.

Awards and Recognitions

Awards for Novels and Novellas

Awards for Comics

Awards for Short Fiction and Other Works

Other Awards and Honors

• 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 – Wole Soyinka Prize for Literature in Africa for Zahrah the Windseeker
• 2012 – Black Excellence Award for Outstanding Achievement in Literature (Fiction) for Zahrah the Windseeker
• 2015 – African Literary Person of the Year from Brittle Paper
• 2016 – Children's Africana Book Award for Best Book for Young Readers for Chicken in the Kitchen
• Mathical Honors for Binti

Selected Film and TV Appearances

• Brave New Souls: Black Sci-Fi & Fantasy Writers of the 21st Century (2013) – She appeared as herself.
• Ada Twist, Scientist (Season 4, Episode 19) — She voiced the character Alex Akerele.

See also

In Spanish: Nnedi Okorafor para niños