Uche Okonkwo's stories have been published in A Public Space, One Story, the Kenyon Review, Ploughshares, The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2019, and Lagos Noir, among others. A former Bernard O'Keefe Scholar at Bread Loaf Writers' Conference and resident at Art Omi, she is a recipient of the George Bennett Fellowship at Phillips Exeter Academy, a Steinbeck Fellowship, and an Elizabeth George Foundation grant. Okonkwo grew up in Lagos, Nigeria, and is currently pursuing a creative writing PhD at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
Finalist for the 2024 Caine Prize For African Writing
An Oprah Daily Most Anticipated Book of 2024
"Steady-handed and gut-punching. I'm in awe."--NoViolet Bulawayo
In ten vivid, evocative stories set in contemporary Nigeria, Uche Okonkwo's extraordinary debut asks: why are the people and places we hold closest so often the ones that drive us to madness?