MichaelHW
Active member
A few years ago I struck up friendship with an African man in a Facebook group for wannabe writers. At the time he was a manual laborer in Edo City in Nigeria. His family had fled from the Boko Haram occupied territories and settled in another part of the country. I thought he had an interesting story. He wanted to study, and we talked about how he would get into the University of Nsukka, where he is now a drama and theater student.
One day a little while after I first encountered him on Facebook, he told he had a manuscript of a fantasy novel that he had written, and he emailed to me. I read through it and noticed that English was not his first language, there were elements of pidgin in what he wrote. But when I disregarded his grammatical shortcomings, I noticed a wonderfully imaginative story with all sort of fascinating characters and magical creatures. And it was set in Africa. It was an African fantasy novel packed with action! A very rare thing.
So I decided to find him a publisher. I searched and searched, but there was no one who would be willing to undertake the amount of work needed without a huge payment. The only person stupid enough to do such a thing was me. So I spent almost year editing and preparing the manuscript. Then there were all sorts of strange problems connected to payment. In Nigeria there are a lot of people who live a sort semi-official existence outside the state. They either do not have identification papers, or they simply have local papers. Only those registered in the national registries have access to full banking services. Payment to my friend Ify therefore had to be secured through one of his older who had an account where you were allowed to deposit dollars. You cannot deposit dollars in any account in Nigeria, you see.
Eventually, the fantasy epic of 500 pages was published on Amazon. Ify could not afford to buy his own book, so I ordered some copies, and sent them too him. However, now the problem of marketing remained. I am still struggling with that. I just hope that someone reads the book, and notices the his wonderful Cobulum characters. I am not sure how I should go about trying to get Ify some much deserved attention. Only a small income from the book would help him through his studies. But when you read the book you will see that Ify does not really need any special favors from anyone. I hope you will have a look at his book. Here is the link to his amazon page
https://www.amazon.com/Flames-Ify-Iroakazi-ebook/dp/B08JKZZMYB
And here is a link to my interview with Ify at my blog:
https://historyradio.org/2020/10/07/self-publishing-in-africa/
Here is his facebook page, if anyone connected to publishing wants to contact him
https://www.facebook.com/ifeanyichukwu.iroakazi
Below is the book cover
One day a little while after I first encountered him on Facebook, he told he had a manuscript of a fantasy novel that he had written, and he emailed to me. I read through it and noticed that English was not his first language, there were elements of pidgin in what he wrote. But when I disregarded his grammatical shortcomings, I noticed a wonderfully imaginative story with all sort of fascinating characters and magical creatures. And it was set in Africa. It was an African fantasy novel packed with action! A very rare thing.
So I decided to find him a publisher. I searched and searched, but there was no one who would be willing to undertake the amount of work needed without a huge payment. The only person stupid enough to do such a thing was me. So I spent almost year editing and preparing the manuscript. Then there were all sorts of strange problems connected to payment. In Nigeria there are a lot of people who live a sort semi-official existence outside the state. They either do not have identification papers, or they simply have local papers. Only those registered in the national registries have access to full banking services. Payment to my friend Ify therefore had to be secured through one of his older who had an account where you were allowed to deposit dollars. You cannot deposit dollars in any account in Nigeria, you see.
Eventually, the fantasy epic of 500 pages was published on Amazon. Ify could not afford to buy his own book, so I ordered some copies, and sent them too him. However, now the problem of marketing remained. I am still struggling with that. I just hope that someone reads the book, and notices the his wonderful Cobulum characters. I am not sure how I should go about trying to get Ify some much deserved attention. Only a small income from the book would help him through his studies. But when you read the book you will see that Ify does not really need any special favors from anyone. I hope you will have a look at his book. Here is the link to his amazon page
https://www.amazon.com/Flames-Ify-Iroakazi-ebook/dp/B08JKZZMYB
And here is a link to my interview with Ify at my blog:
https://historyradio.org/2020/10/07/self-publishing-in-africa/
Here is his facebook page, if anyone connected to publishing wants to contact him
https://www.facebook.com/ifeanyichukwu.iroakazi
Below is the book cover
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