The Ake Arts and Book Festival has announced a call for entries for the 2018 edition of their annual journal, Ake Review.

According to the statement issued, the theme for this year’s festival which is the 6th Edition is: Fantastical Futures, focused on a re-imagined African future.


Explaining further on the scope of the submissions, the statement continued, “What lessons have been learnt following our understanding of governance, gender and sexuality, literacy and education, health and well being? What events and attitudes will shape the Africa of our dreams? We are interested in submissions that engage these topics.”

All original and unpublished single entries must be submitted via email to editor@akefestival.org as attachments with “ARA Submission” in the subject line on or before Monday 20th July, 2018.

Meanwhile, successful creatives in the form of poetry (maximum of 3 poems), prose (maximum of 1600 words) and Artwork (maximum of 2 works in high-res jpeg) with a biography of maximum of 70 words will receive 2 copies of Ake Review and a token payment will be communicated directly

Africa Unpublished is an ongoing project which will be hosted on a website with same name. The project is the brainchild of Kudakwashe Dhoro, a Zimbabwean bookpreneur who has identified the need for unpublished African writers to be heard and read. The website is a platform for the presentation and showcasing of hitherto unpublished African literary works, from both established as well as budding writers. Writers will be re quired to create free accounts on the portal and they will create a profile that will among other things allow them to give a brief background of who they are, their style and genre, give titles of previously published work and have such options as work in progress, ask for collaboration and mentorship. Membership will be free and each writer will have their own writing portfolio, and with time, there will be a community that will exchange writing tips via various fora, thus providing writers with the opportunity to meet and bond with fresh creative minds. It is envisioned that every quarter, a panel of literature experts will review submissions (sample chapters and overviews of the whole book or poetry projects) and select a set number that they will incubate. The website itself is designed to act as an incubation hub for writers, providing them with guidance and mentorship, helping them develop their craft, raise their profile and, ultimately get publishers to notice their work. The site will also have an option for content creators (film or TV) to scout for and buy screenplay ideas, through a separate registration process. This will allow for the creation of a “one-stop shop” for African writers, publishers, content seekers and the general reading populace.
www.africaunpublished.com will also act as a social or community network for published and unpublished African writers of all skill levels and readers who are seeking new and innovative literature. Readers and publishers will be afforded an opportunity to discover new authors who will be able to share their work, gain recognition, and connect with their readers and each other.
Writers will be able to:
• Post excerpts of their work.
• Receive and respond to feedback from the community.
• Be selected for mentorship by other established writers and academics.
• Receive guidance on self-publishing and marketing of their work.
• Submit links to creative writing published elsewhere.

Readers will be able to:
• Give feedback and critique excerpts submitted by the writers.
• Comment on what they would have read.
• Become fans and buy published works by the authors who are members of the community.
• Communicate, interact with and support their preferred writers.

In addition, there will be pages and forums where volunteer specialists will provide workshops and courses on the art of writing and detailed reviews of selected stories. The goal of Africa Unpublished is to provide writers with an easy way to publish and promote their work and to afford readers and publishers access to new and novel creative writing that is easily accessible on any devices capable of connecting to the internet. It also ties in well with our government’s push to promote innovation through the creation of incubation hub, it is what one might call a virtual incubation hub which has the potential to nurture new writing talent and make African literature more accessible to the whole world.