Race, Faith and Community in Contemporary Britain Essays on Black, African, and African Caribbean Muslims in the UK PROUDLY MUSLIM & BLACK REPORT 2022

Getting published is not easy, especially for Black writers. The UK publishing industry is
overwhelmingly white, middle-class and has historically excluded people of colour (Saha and
Van Lente, 2020). Becoming a published author in the UK is difficult for Black Muslim writers in
particular, given the various challenges they face in mainstream and Muslim book publishing.
UK publishing industry
The UK’s publishing industry, with a turnover of £6bn in 2018, makes a significant contribution
to Britain’s creative industries, generating £102bn a year for the British economy. Although
the book industry is fairly lucrative, there is a notable earnings gap between successful writers
and others. The top 10% of writers earn about 70% of total earnings in the profession. The
average (median) earnings of a professional author is £10,500 (The Society of Authors, 2019).
However, the average (median) earnings of a professional author’s household is £50,000. Most
professional writers have another job to supplement their writing income, with just 28% of
authors making a living from writing alone without a second job, down from 40% in 2006.
Publishing Challenges For
Black Muslim Writers
by Habeeb Akande
Following the worldwide Black Lives Matter protests in 2020, there has been a significant
growth in book sales by Black authors, which resulted in Reni Eddo-Lodge becoming the first
Black British author to top the UK book charts in June 2020 (Flood, 2020). First published in
2017, Eddo-Lodge’s award-winning Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race
started life as a popular blog in 2014. Similarly, Black mixed-race writers, such as Afua Hirsh
and Akala experienced a significant growth in sales with their best-selling books, Brit(ish)
and Natives. Despite the recent success of some Black and mixed-race authors, the British
publishing industry remains predominantly white at all levels.
To address the industry’s “deep-rooted racial inequalities,” more than 200 Black and mixedrace
writers set up the Black Writers’ Guild (BWG), requesting more diversity from major UK
publishers (Cain, 2020). Few Black Muslims were part of the BWG signatory list. In the UK,
Black Muslim voices are often absent from wider discussions about Black Britons and activism.
Black people make up 4% of the UK population, and Black Muslims represent 10% of the UK’s
Muslim population. Black Muslims are a minority within a minority in Britain. This can make the
task twice as hard to get published due to the additional challenges a Black Muslim is likely to
encounter in Black, Muslim, and British spaces.
Challenges
For writers who aspire to be published, the acquisition stage is generally seen as the most
important and most challenging (Saha and Van Lente, 2020). Agents and commissioning editors
have a lot of power to get writers published. They serve as the gatekeepers to mainstream
publishing. A 2020 academic study on diversity in UK publishing revealed that finding writers
of colour and publishing them successfully remains a challenge for British publishers. The
report found a lack of diversity in the industry and strongly encouraged industry professionals
to reflect on their practices, challenge their assumptions, and change their behaviour to “make
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