Chiemeka Nicely
Author.
Builder.
Visionary.
Africanfuturism · Nicely Publishing · London
"I always imagined creating my own world. Because I never felt like I belonged in this one."
For readers, dreamers, and visionaries of the African diaspora. We are reclaiming imagination, honouring our ancestry, and shaping futures where our stories lead the way, beyond the limits of what we've been told is possible.
Where African soul meets cosmic vision
The Story
Chi·e·mek·a · "God has done much"
My name has always felt like a testimony waiting to be understood. Chi-e-mek-a. God has done much. I didn't fully feel the weight of it until I looked back at everything this path has asked of me, and realised I was still here.
I have always walked between worlds. Not quite fitting the one I was born into, I did what dreamers do. I built my own. The universe you are stepping into didn't begin with a book deal or a plan. It began with a question I could not stop asking: what if the future remembered where it came from?
Over seven years I built this, on and off, stumbling, finding my footing, losing it, and finding it again. There were seasons of doubt, false starts, and moments where everything had to be dismantled before it could be rebuilt properly. I left employment to pursue this full-time. I made mistakes that cost me time, money, and certainty. I kept going anyway.
"My greatest achievement isn't the book. It's the decision to walk my own path and keep walking it, even when I couldn't see where it was going."
Whispers of the Sixth, once called The Masterpiece, transformed over years into the first book of The Shadow I Cast series, is both an arrival and a beginning. And Nicely Publishing, the independent creative media brand I founded alongside it, is how this world reaches beyond me.
I hold Sankofa as my compass. The ancient Akan principle of reaching back to reclaim what was lost, then carrying it forward. For Black men and women of the diaspora who have never seen their full selves in speculative fiction, their power, their ancestry, their futures, this universe is built for you. By us. For us.
I feel like I have arrived. And I know there is still so much work to do. Both things are true. Both things keep me moving.
This is not a perfect journey. It is an honest one. And I would not trade a single mistake for the clarity it brought.
BBB Festival · Barbican · October 2025
What I'm Building
A Creative Media Ecosystem
Nicely Publishing is not just a publishing house. It is an independent creative media brand expanding through original fiction, professional services, and digital products, built to scale, built to last, built to leave something behind.
The Fiction Universe
An Africanfuturist shared universe rooted in Egyptian-inspired dynasties, the diaspora's spiritual memory, and the untold futures of Black men and women, By us, for us. The Shadow I Cast series. Short stories. An anthology. A world still expanding.
Publishing Services
Professional interior formatting, editorial, and AI copywriting services for independent authors, the same rigour applied to every manuscript as if it were my own. Under the Nicely Publishing name.
Digital Products & Systems
Planners, guides, and creator tools that support the intentional creative. The Year of the Horse planner. Future resources for authors building on their own terms. The ecosystem expanding through systems.
The Debut Novel
The Shadow I Cast · Book One
Whispers of the Sixth
Princess Calista has always been different, born with the Blue Flame,
sent on a mission that was never supposed to change her. But something ancient
is waking inside her. And it won't wait.
Seven years of becoming. A story that transformed alongside its author,
once called The Masterpiece, now the first book in The Shadow I Cast series.
Africanfuturism, Egyptian-inspired dynasties, and an awakening that was always inevitable.
Perfect for fans of N.K. Jemisin, Tade Thompson, and Tomi Adeyemi.
From the Universe
A world in motion.
This is what Acirfa feels like before the words begin.