DIKE EKEJIUBA

Dike Ekejiuba is a family man and lover of lesser known or history – especially relating to the obscure or paranormal. He resides in Lagos and Abuja and when not pursuing a living, pursues life by cycling periodically and writing short or long stories as often as the muse will allow.

Tell us about how you got started with writing, and how the ride has been so far.

I’ve been writing for as long as I can remember: tracing words from toddler books, copying children’s fairy tales (inventing some of my own as well), sketching adventure stories after – and sometimes during – school lessons, and so on. I think the moment I realised the power of personal writing was when I reimagined the ending to the well-known tale of the Three Little Pigs, giving it a twist that both fascinated and scared the crap out of four-year-old me. Even then, I knew that there would be no going back, that I’d eventually end up writing, no matter where life took me.

I’ve only been writing steadily for about four years now, so comparatively I’m a neophyte. I believe my abilities are still developing, so it’s been a journey as much of self-discovery as it is of expression. Either way, I love the writing, the editing. The rest of it - publication, promotion, etc…. not so much.

 

What has been the biggest obstacles along your way in this writing business?

First off, time. As a married father of three and a hustling ex-bank worker striving to stay afloat in the economic quagmire that is our country today, there’s never enough time to spend fleshing out inspiration that strikes. Also, despite (and perhaps due to) the relative ease of getting published on such platforms as Amazon, added to the fact that publishing in Nigeria has generally fallen far from its former aspirational heights, it’s a tougher sector to become noted in. I could be happy just being a journeyman writer, though – for me, it’s more of a labour of love.

 

How would you describe your writing style?

One constantly and desperately trying to glean from the giants, old and recent – Clive Barker, Chinua Achebe, Stephen King, R.L. Stevenson, M. Marshall-Smith, Elechi Amadi, Chimamanda Adichie, Shakespeare, Gaiman, Miller, Moore, Hadley Chase, and so on. I’m a fan of Barker’s garish descriptiveness, Achebe’s clarity and love for succinct proverb, King’s grand narrative flow, Adichie’s simplicity and prose. If any single style has come out of such admiration, it’s a mishmash at best. I grew up on as much of comic book heroes and British tales of swashbuckling adventure, as on the gritty realismof James Ellroy’s crime noir tales. My principal genre being suspense and the paranormal, I attempt to write in a way that best expresses the inner turmoil of my characters– be they murderous psychopaths or selfless altruists.

 

What inspired you to take a bite at such a daring project as Distant Shores?

A dearth of knowledge about such things. With the recent rise of African and Afro-based speculative writing and movies, increased reference has been made to acts of defiance and revolt by slaves during that terrible era, but most of what is written originates from overseas. I wanted to write from an indigenous perspective, especially on what hits so ethnically close to home. I also wanted to depict as much as possible how it felt to be young Igbo men violently torn from home and made to suffer a traumatic trans-Atlantic journey.

I’m also a paranormal suspense writer, so of course I had to infuse those elements into the historical plot.

 

The Igbo Landing is an historical event that hasn’t been explored so much in literature. How difficult was the research you had to do?

Oh, quite. I’m what’s known as a pantser when it comes to story plotting, so I had to learn new approaches to writing historical fiction – a genre where accuracy, especially when it comes to incontestable facts, is key. Luckily for me, the volume of such knowledge out there allowed me to take a lot of artistic licence and apply creativity where it is most effective. Also, the relevant information that absolutely needed to be accurate (geographical locations, time frames, pivotal events, etc.) were readily available online or on other published works, so it worked out.

 

For a writer of fiction based on real historical African events, what impact or awareness do you hope to inspire in contemporary society?

 Mainly just that – awareness. And hopefully the enjoyment of a decent paranormal revenge yarn. The old saying about not knowing where one comes from being a crutch against knowing where one has to go still rings true. Last Christmas, I was fortunate enough to be asked to deliver several signed copies of DS: Vol 1 to the paramount ruler of an autonomous community in one of the south-eastern states, as well as a short video presentation explaining the roots of the story as relates to the identity of ndi Igbo both here in Nigeria and the diaspora. That sort of hunger for culture-based knowledge is what personally inspires me, and is what I hope to inspire in others, Igbo or not.

 

There’s a poor level of knowledge of African history among the young people. Would you say it’s as a result of lack of interest to read about it, or limited availability of books on these subjects?

A bit of both actually, although one does lead the other. I mean, you really can’t blame the youth of nowadays for a lack of interest in something they’ve hardly been exposed to ever since someone thought it wise to limit or altogether eliminate the teaching of history in our schools. In fact, I blame a lot of the disaffection exhibited by our young people on the discovery of such conspiracy to keep the truths about our nation’s history hidden, leaving them to find out such things by themselves, and from other, highly dubious sources. If young people were made aware of the greatness shown by others like themselves who overcame adversity in the far or near past (some of whose activities would beat out any contemporary Hollywood creation) they would gladly identify with such. No nation’s history is perfect, but it is a downright travesty to try to whitewash or – God forbid – bury it.

 

We often complain about the poor reading culture among African youths. Do you think writers and players in the literary community are doing enough about it?

Unfortunately, respect for writers is at an all-time low, in my opinion. In an age of seconds-long video/sound bites and narrowing attention spans, it’s getting more difficult to engage people (funny, since most ‘intelligent content’ today stems from good writing – itself becoming a thing too few and far between).

I believe there was a period when the development of creative writing was actively stifled in our history, and we’re only just waking up to the possibilities. The existence of organisations like Bookause, Farafina, Cassava, as well as local selling platforms competing with international ones is a good sign of it. Again, unfortunately, we’ve become a society where being erudite (not bombastic) has taken a long back seat to crass wealth and exhibitionism. The youth are only emulating the cross-eyed monster that the older generation fed to chilling, vibrant life.

Tell us about your other books and what they’re about.

I’ve written drafts of at least six other books, though only two of them are purely in the historical paranormal fiction genre that I want to specialise in. There’s Iva – my interpretation of tragic events that occurred on November 18, 1949, when a crew of striking miners were shot and killed in cold blood at the then British owned coal mine at Iva Valley, Enugu town. I’ve also completed draft on Sentinels, my account of the supernatural origins of a large collection of strange soapstone figurines that can still be found today inside a sacred forest near Esie Town in Illorin, Kwara state.

My other completed but unpublished works are in the suspense genre: Invisible Circus & Other Tales, The King and the Alien, Boomtown, but my most recent, Flight of The Incanter, is a medieval sword and sorcery fantasy I wrote on a dare with other members of a writing group I belong to.

I’m currently outlining another paranormal history tale concerning the supposed burial site of the Queen of Sheba (also called Bilikisu Sungbo) somewhere in Ijebu-Ode.