As a Black Lord of the Rings fan, I felt left out of fantasy worlds. So I created my own | Namina Forna

Author Namina Forna loved JRR Tolkien and CS Lewis' books as a child, but saw little that resembled the magic and rich mythology she saw in Africa

When I was a child, I was what you would call a JRR Tolkien fangirl. I read The Lord of the Rings over and over. I traipsed around the countryside, imagining it was Middle-earth. With just a flight of imagination, I could be snug in the Shire, exploring the mines of Moria, or even flitting through the woods of Lothlorien.

When the first Lord of the Rings movie was finally released, I was 14 and so excited to see it. But immediately, I noticed something distressing: no one on screen looked like me. The darkest characters on screen, the orcs, were all male. Even as a monster, it seemed, there was no place for people who looked like me in Tolkien's world.