Ellah Wakatama Allfrey joins Canongate as editor-at-large

Former Indigo Press publishing director Ellah Wakatama Allfrey will join Canongate's London office as editor-at-large later this month, working on fiction.

Reporting to publishing director Francis Bickmore and starting on 18th June, Allfrey will have an open commissioning brief with an emphasis on the fiction. This part-time role, consisting of 2.5 days a week, represents an expansion of Canongate’s editorial team, taking its acquiring editorial team up to five members.

Most recently she was publishing director of Indigo Press but she has also worked as deputy editor at Granta magazine and as senior editor at Jonathan Cape. She has commissioned stories for Audible and BBC Radio 4, written various journalistic pieces and has reviewed and presented for BBC Radio 4 and NPR as well as judging a number of literary prizes.

Additionally Wakatama Allfrey sits on the Advisory Council of Art for Amnesty and the advisory board of the Johannesburg Review of Books, is a chair for the Caine Prize for African Writing and a trustee of the Jalada African Writers' Collective and The Royal Literary Fund.

Commenting on her new role, Wakatama Allfrey said: “This is a wonderful opportunity to be part of a team that has, over time, published with such great flair and innovation. I am excited to be joining Canongate and to have such an inspiring brief - to contribute to a list that reflects range, ambition, passion and a genuine belief in the power of writing to enrich and inform.”

Bickmore said: “Ellah is the best of the best when it comes to commissioning and editing. We are thrilled that she is joining Canongate. We need books that look beyond the horizon if we are to understand the challenging ways in which the world is changing, and those are the books that Ellah has found instinctively for more than two decades. I can’t wait to see which writers she champions first.”

Ellah will be based in Canongate’s London office and can be reached on ellah@canongate.co.uk.