Four African writers have secured six nominations between them on the 2026 British Fantasy Awards shortlists. Established by the British Fantasy Society and running since 1971, the BFAs have for over five decades served as a barometer of excellence in speculative fiction, covering everything from novels and novellas to non-fiction, short fiction, audio, and art. This year’s winners will be announced at Fantasycon in Glasgow from October 9 to 11, 2026. That four African writers feature across multiple categories of the 2026 shortlists is both a celebration and a signal.

British-Nigerian author M.H. Ayinde earns the most dazzling double: her debut novel A Song of Legends Lost, published by Orbit, is shortlisted for both Best Fantasy Novel (The Robert Holdstock Award) and Best Newcomer. Drawing on Yoruba cosmology and the histories of precolonial African cultures, the novel follows Temi, a commoner who accidentally invokes a powerful ancestral spirit in a world where only nobles hold that power. It went on to become a Sunday Times bestseller, a debut that announced itself not as a quiet arrival but as a full entrance. The Robert Holdstock Award is named after the beloved British fantasy author and carries real weight in the genre. Orbit’s commitment to publishing this book at full scale deserves recognition.

Eugen Bacon, a well known name in the speculative fiction space, lands two nominations. Her critical essay Spec Fic and the Politics of Identity: Finding the Self in Other is shortlisted for Best Non-Fiction, published in Strange Horizons, the same magazine that appears on the Best Magazine/Periodical shortlist this year. That Strange Horizons holds nominations in two separate categories in the same year speaks to what the publication continues to do for African and diasporic voices in speculative fiction, and we are glad to shout them out. Bacon’s second nomination is for Best Novella for The Nga’phandileh Whisperer: A Sauútiverse Novella, published by Stars and Sabres Publishing. The Sauútiverse is an Afrocentric collaborative world built by writers from across Africa and the diaspora, rooted in African language, culture, and mythology. Bacon is already a British Fantasy Award winner, a twice World Fantasy Award finalist, and a finalist in the Shirley Jackson and Philip K. Dick Awards, her return to these shortlists confirms she is one of the most decorated African speculative fiction writers working today.

South African author C.L. Hellisen’s short story Shadow Jack, published in Giganotosaurus, appears on the Best Short Story shortlist, a significant nod to one of South Africa’s most consistently inventive speculative voices. And Nigerian scholar Chukwunonso Ezeiyoke rounds out the African presence with a Best Non-Fiction nomination for Nigerian Speculative Fiction: Evolution, published by Routledge India, an academic work that brings Nigerian SFF into formal critical conversation on a global stage and makes an overdue case for the genre’s depth and history on the continent.

Finally, a special shout-out to Flame Tree Press, nominated for Best Independent Press, a publisher that has consistently championed bold, diverse, and African-adjacent speculative work, and whose presence on these shortlists year after year is not accidental.