Wasafiri Wonders

'A world leader who reads books at all is no longer a sure thing.' … Ever wondered what your favourite author’s first drafts look like? Or which book they love that nobody’s heard of? Wasafiri Wonders is a series that asks these questions for you.

'It is a tale of two sisters – one who murders men and the other who is forced to clean up after her.' … Ever wondered what your favourite author’s first drafts look like? Or which book they love that nobody’s heard of? Wasafiri Wonders is a series that asks these questions for you.

'Light cast on me should make others understand it’s better to not think of sharing the table with me.' … Ever wondered what your favourite author’s first drafts look like? Or which book they love that nobody’s heard of? Wasafiri Wonders is a series that asks these questions for you.

Photograph by Victor Adewale … 'I always find myself drawn to stories that folks don’t hear too much about, particularly if they have to do with Africans or their descendants around the world.' … Ever wondered what your favourite writer’s first drafts look like?

Photography by Hayley Madden for Spread The Word … 'Grief is as much of a universal language as music is.' … Ever wondered what your favourite writer’s first drafts look like? Or which book they love that nobody’s heard of?  Wasafiri  Wonders is a series that asks these questions for you.

‘Don’t write what you know (boring advice). Write what you want to find out, what you want to know, what you don’t know, what you are curious about.’ … Ever wondered what your favourite author’s first drafts look like? Or which book they love that nobody’s heard of?

'When I am writing I need to feel removed from my body and myself and what I think it knows. I want to enter what I call "the poetic mind". When I am in that space, time moves differently.' … Ever wondered what your favourite author’s first drafts look like?

'First drafts are a pie where all the components have been cooked most of the way through, but you’ve gotta put it in the oven for it to become worthy of your guests.' … Ever wondered what your favourite writer’s first drafts look like?

'A rapper once told me it was important to be the first customer of everything you do.' … Ever wondered what your favourite writer’s first drafts look like? Or which book they love that nobody’s heard of?  Wasafiri  Wonders is a series that asks these questions for you.

'My books explore the African diaspora: past, present, real, imagined. I’m always surprised when some people find the idea of this limiting.' … Ever wondered what your favourite writer’s first drafts look like?

'I believe a queer world has the potential to be a free world, but whilst people are still discriminated against on the basis of gender identity or sexuality we are so far from being free.' … Ever wondered what your favourite writer’s first drafts look like?

Photography by Charlie Hopkinson … 'Ordinary People is already a kind of music album in literary form and has its own playlist, downloadable from Spotify.' … Ever wondered what your favourite writer’s first drafts look like?

'I feel as if my first drafts are almost like codes waiting to be configured into an understandable algorithm.' … Ever wondered what your favourite writer’s first drafts look like? Or which book they love that nobody’s heard of?  Wasafiri  Wonders is a series that asks these questions for you.

'I suspect that we, as a species, have a drive to make sense and to make beauty, optimally at the same time.' … Ever wondered what your favourite writer’s first drafts look like? Or which book they love that nobody’s heard of?  Wasafiri  Wonders is a series that asks these questions for you.

'The first draft is handwritten with a fountain-pen on A4 grid paper, then it’s typed and edited at the same time...