Shani Akilah is a Black British Caribbean writer from South London. She is the author of For Such a Time as This, which won Best Short Story Collection at the 2024 Cosmopolitan Book Awards and has been optioned for TV. She holds a Master’s degree in African Studies from the University of Oxford and has served as a literary judge the 2026 Brick Lane Bookshop Short Story Prize and the 2023 Nota Bene Prize. In 2024, the Shani Akilah Library opened in Woolwich in recognition of her contributions to literature and community. Booker Prize winner Bernardine Evaristo has described her as ‘a glittering new voice in the literary firmament’.