Irenosen Okojie Looks Radiant For the Launch of Her New Novel Butterfly Fish

Jacaranda Books is a fast-growing publishing house based in London. We are very happy about the attention they’re giving to African fiction.

Just last year, they published Obinna Udenwe‘s Satans and Shaitans, a conspiracy crime thriller set in Nigeria.

And now they are out with Irenosen Okojie’s Butterfly Fish. The novel chronicles the experience of a London-based photographer, “who, inspired by an ancient Nigerian brass artefact she inherits after her mother’s sudden death, sets out to trace her family history, taking the reader on a journey from the 19th century Kingdom of Benin, through to 1950s Nigeria and 1970s London, and revealing deeply hidden family secrets along the way.” 

A few weeks ago, Jacaranda Books, in collaboration with West End Lane Books, organized a launch party for Okojie’s debut novel.

Okojie, who read from Butterfly Fish during the event, looked gorgeous in a print dress and tan heels.

The lawyer-turned-novelist “gave a heart-warming speech in which she thanked her many supporters, including her agent Elise Dilsworth, formerly commissioning editor at Virago Books, Alex Wheatle MBE who described her as ‘one of the most original and innovative writers to emerge in many a year’, and her mentor Donna Daley-Clarke, winner of the 2006 Commonwealth Prize.”

Margaret Busby, the co-founder of Allison & Busby, attended the event. Other high-profile attendees include “Yvvette Edwards, Joy Francis, founder of Words of Colour, and fellow Jacaranda author and WHSmith bestseller Frances Mensah Williams (From Pasta to Pigfoot).”

Congrats to Okojie and Jacaranda Books!

See photos from the event below.