Image from The Culture Trip.

Accord Literary is a Ghana-based literary agency founded by the UK publisher Sarah Odedina and the Ghanaian publisher Deborah Ahenkorah. They are one of the five African organizations in publishing awarded a $20,000 grant from the African Publishing Innovation Fund for projects that will develop literacy, book accessibility, and the use of African indigenous languages in literature.

As part of the project with the African Publishing Innovation Fund, and in line with its founding objective to mentor, develop, and encourage African authors writing for young readers, Accord Literary is launching a call for submission of stories. It is open for submissions of novels written for young readers aged between 8 and 16 years old. Submissions must include a bio, a synopsis, and either the entire work of fiction or the first three chapters. The manuscript should either be for a younger reader aged 8 to 12 and up to 50,000 words, or for an older reader aged 12 to 16 and up to 75,000 words. The book can be in any genre, from historical fiction to fantasy, and be about any subject.

The deadline for submissions is March 15, 2020. Accepted writers will be contacted by June 31, 2020. Authors whose works are not accepted will be notified and their works will be deleted from Accord Literary’s system.

Submission Guidelines:

  • The works submitted have to be original works of fiction and not infringe any copyright
  • The works are to be free for worldwide publication
  • Accord Literary will offer advice and guidance on editorial issues with the view to mentoring authors to create works ready for submission to international publishers
  • Accord Literary will enter agreements with authors, with all terms and conditions of representation
  • Accord Literary will delete all copies of authors work from our system if we will not be working with the author to develop their writing

Submissions and enquiries should be emailed to [email protected].