Ngozi Achebe was born in London to Augustine, an engineer and his wife Matilda, a nurse and was raised in Nigeria. They instilled in their children an early love for books, which was an indispensible part of Achebe household. The Achebe children read the usual fare that was usually served up to the children of 1960’s and 70’s Nigeria  –Lewis Caroll’s Alice in Wonderland,  the fairytales of  Hans Christian Andersen and the Brothers Grim. Ms Achebe at this time also developed a liking for the crime novels of the English crime writer Agatha Christie.

She also had an early introduction to books by African writers by the lucky happenstance of being related to two people that had were heavily  involved with the African book scene in the sixties.

The first was her late uncle John Achebe who was a book agent for major publishers such as Longmans, Thomas Nelson and Heinemann Educational Books and who  also owned an immense private library. His house has been described by Ms Achebe as a “bookworm’s paradise of unlimited literary discovery.”

Secondly, the world renowned writer, Chinua Achebe of Things Fall Apart fame, currently a Professor of African studies at Brown University  is also her uncle and it was through his work as the editorial adviser to the African Writer’s Series (AWS) that Ms Achebe became acquainted with and was later to be influenced by the numerous works of authors from that continent.  The AWS was a Heinemann project that was started in 1963 to showcase African writers and Chinua Achebe was its pioneering chief editorial adviser, a service he provided to that publishing house and its authors for over ten years. Ms Achebe credits this fortunate circumstance with making her aware at an early age of the works of writers such as Cyprain Ekwensi, J.P.  Clark, John Munonye,  Kenneth Kaunda,  Duro Ladipo,  Ferdinand Oyono, Gabriel Okara, Ngugi Wa Thiong’O, Christopher Okigbo and the trailblazing female novelist and later publisher,  Flora Nwapa.

Ms Achebe had her secondary education at Queen’s School Enugu and went on to medical school at the University of Nigeria. She later returned to England for further medical training which she completed before going to United States of America for her postgraduate medical degree. She has over the years tried to balance her writing with her role as a mother and her vocation as a physician.

Her early work has touched on the Nigerian civil war, which was also known as the Nigerian- Biafran War – a catastrophic event that engulfed Nigeria in the late sixties and early seventies. She has described this period as being crucial to her writing and has called it a “potent definer of many a childhood memory.”  When asked about the references to Biafra in her 16^th century themed debut novel Onaedo:The Blacksmith’s Daughter, she has often said that “it would have been unthinkable for me to write any kind of book about anything at all without referencing that period of my life.”  However she is quick to point out that she has written of happier themes and her goal is to write a humorous book one day.

*Ngozi Achebe currently lives in the United States with her children, Jennifer and Nnamdi and is a practicing physician. Onaedo – The Blacksmith’s Daughter is her debut novel.