African Woman Nets Publishing Partnership w/Major US House

Deborah Ahenkorah Osei-Agyekum, based in Ghana, is co-founder of Accord Literary (based in London) alongside her business partner Sarah Odedina. Accord Literary was formed to develop and distribute books by African artists for young readers.

Norton Younger Readers (NYR), one of the largest US publishers, is collaborating with Deborah and Sarah to bring children’s and YA books written by African authors to a larger audience. In this initial deal, NYR has acquired the rights to six books with hopes to produce many more.

A Look at Deborah Ahenkorah Osei-Agyekum: Hailing from Accra, Ghana, when Ahenkorah Osei-Agyekum was younger, she failed to find children’s book characters and stories that reflected her own skin and experience by African authors.

This deficit fueled her on a path to becoming a prestigious, award-winning publisher and prominent advocate for bringing more authentic African stories to the children’s literature industry.

As the executive director and co-founder of the children’s literacy NGO, Golden Baobab, and founder of the publishing house African Bureau Stories, Deborah leveraged her expertise and decorated record to secure a collaboration with one of the largest publishers in the US.

A Look at Sarah Odedina: Sarah Odedina is Deborah’s partner at Accord Literary who was inspired to join forces after straining to find books that reflected her two young half-Nigerian girls with her husband Abe Odedina.

Sarah recalls her family ”struggling to find books and stories that they felt offered them a realistic and positive portrayal of the African continent.”

Norton Young Readers is an imprint of W. W. Norton & Company, an independent employee-owned publishing house created in 1923. Nearly 100 years later, it's one of the largest publishers, putting out 400 books a year including college and trade materials.

Although their catalog for the youngest of readers doesn't feature many books from black authors and illustrators - despite having black and brown characters on several covers - they have now launched a middle-grade series kicking off with the story of Adams Bah, who details the discrimination she faced as a Black Muslim American after 9/11 in Accused: My Story of Injustice.

Overseeing the collaboration from the Norton Young Readers side is their publishing director, Simon Boughton. He joined W. W. Norton & Company in 2019 to launch an imprint dedicated to children and young adult books.

Below, we’ll highlight two of the upcoming releases from their new partnership.

The first story, set to launch May 2021, is titled Crossing the Stream by Elizabeth Irene-Baitie. This middle-grade novel, set in Accra, follows the story of a boy named Ato who loses his treasured father at a young age. After spending the summer with his grandmother, he learns hidden gems of his father's life and tales of his family's history that reach back generations. In addition to writing several award-winning young adult books, Irene-Baitie is a Ghana-based molecular biologist!

The second release, expected in August 2021, is Playing a Dangerous Game by Patrick Ochieng. Set in 1970s Kenya, a group of young boys chasing ghost tales in a haunted house find themselves threatened by a local coffee smuggler and wrapped up in a criminal underworld. Kenya-based Patrick Ochieng is a lawyer and author who was shortlisted for The Golden Baobab writing prize in 2010.

Editor’s Note: We wrote this piece to celebrate Deborah and Sarah as two women navigating the often challenging space of children’s publishing to help create more opportunities for African creators!

Guest UserFebruary 24, 2021Comment