Othuke Ominiabohs, founder and publisher of Masobe Books, has acquired the Nigerian rights to five works by Tanzanian-Australian author Eugen Bacon, bringing some of the most decorated writing in contemporary African speculative fiction into the hands of Nigerian readers.

The five titles span Bacon’s range as a writer. Mage of Fools is an Afrofuturistic dystopian novel at the intersection of climate crisis and socialism. The Road to Woop Woop and Other Stories is an African-Australian short story collection. Serengotti is a literary novel shaped by the strangeness and longings of a displaced community. Danged Black Thing collects stories about love, migration, gender, class, patriarchy, and womanhood. A fifth title, Chasing Whispers, an Afro-irrealist collection of Black speculative fiction, is a forthcoming acquisition slated for 2027.

What makes this deal notable beyond its literary contents is the infrastructure behind it. The acquisition was brokered in direct partnership with Tricia Reeks of Meerkat Press in the United States, Barry Scott of Transit Lounge in Melbourne, and Bacon herself, no agent, no intermediary, just three internationally minded presses and a writer moving with shared purpose. It is precisely the kind of publishing alliance that Masobe’s growth has made possible and that the broader African publishing ecosystem needs more of.

Bacon responded to the deal with characteristic directness: “I am deeply moved and exhilarated by the open-mindedness of these publishers coming together for a mutually beneficial arrangement without leaping gazillion hoops.” It is a fitting sentiment from a writer whose career has been defined by refusing the margins. A Solstice, British Fantasy, Ignyte, Locus, and Foreword Indies Award winner, Bacon has also been a finalist for the World Fantasy Award, the Shirley Jackson Award, the Aurealis Award, the Philip K. Dick Award, and the Nommo Awards for Speculative Fiction by Africans, among the most significant recognition available to African speculative writers globally.

We have followed Bacon’s trajectory with particular attention at Brittle Paper. When the BSFA Awards longlist came out in January and she led the African contingent with eight nominations across four categories, we covered it. When she picked up a double nomination at the Foreword INDIES last month, we covered that too. And last week, at Eastercon in Birmingham, she took home the BSFA Award for Best Non-Fiction (Short) for her essay in Strange Horizons. For Masobe to now claim her for Nigerian readers is not just a publishing deal, it is a statement about what African publishing is capable of when it reaches for writers of genuine international consequence.