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Aminatta Forna biography

Author Biography  | Books by this Author  | Read-Alikes

Aminatta Forna
Photo: © Simon Westcott

Aminatta Forna

How to pronounce Aminatta Forna: A-mi-na-tta FOR-na

Aminatta Forna Biography

Aminatta Forna was born in Glasgow and raised in Sierra Leone and the United Kingdom. She is the author of The Memory of Love, Ancestor Stones, The Devil that Danced on the Water, and The Memory of Love, which has been selected as one of the Best Books of the Year by the Sunday Telegraph, Financial Times and Times.

In 2002 Forna helped to build a primary school in her family's village of Rogbonko. The building of the school was the first step in what would become known as the Rogbonko Project: a community effort to create an escape route from poverty through multiple initiatives in the spheres of education, agriculture, infrastructure and health.

Forna is a trustee of the Royal Literary Fund and sits on the advisory committee of the Caine Prize for African Writing. She has also published essays and articles, and written for television and radio. Her television credits include the arts documentary Through African Eyes (BBC), the documentary series Africa Unmasked (Channel 4) and in 2009, The Lost Libraries of Timbuktu (BBC). Her writing has appeared in Granta, The Sunday Times, The Observer and Vogue Magazine among others. She lives in London.

She is currently Lannan Visiting Chair of Poetics at Georgetown University and Professor of Creative Writing at Bath Spa University. She has been named a finalist for the 2016 Neustadt Award. Both prizes are awarded for an author's body of work.

Aminatta Forna as made OBE in the Queen's New Year's Honours 2017.

Aminatta Forna's website

This bio was last updated on 06/27/2017. In a perfect world, we would like to keep all of BookBrowse's biographies up to date, but with many thousands of lives to keep track of it's simply impossible to do. So, if the date of this bio is not recent, you may wish to do an internet search for a more current source, such as the author's website or social media presence. If you are the author or publisher and would like us to update this biography, send the complete text and we will replace the old with the new.

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Books by this Author

Books by Aminatta Forna at BookBrowse
Happiness jacket The Hired Man jacket The Memory of Love jacket Ancestor Stones jacket
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Read-Alikes

All the books below are recommended as read-alikes for Aminatta Forna but some maybe more relevant to you than others depending on which books by the author you have read and enjoyed. So look for the suggested read-alikes by title linked on the right.
How we choose read-alikes

  • Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

    Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

    Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie was born in Nigeria in 1977. She is from Abba, in Anambra State, but grew up in the university town of Nsukka where she attended primary and secondary schools and briefly studied Medicine and ... (more)

    If you enjoyed:
    Ancestor Stones

    Try:
    The Thing Around Your Neck
    by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

  • Russell Banks

    Russell Banks

    Russell Banks was raised in New Hampshire and eastern Massachusetts. The eldest of four children, he grew up in a working-class environment, which has played a major role in his writing.

    Mr. Banks (who was the first in his... (more)

    If you enjoyed:
    Ancestor Stones

    Try:
    The Darling
    by Russell Banks

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