Born in 1956 in Tamale, in northern Ghana, she studied industrial design at the University of Science and Technology of Kumasi. After a few years, she decided to move abroad and lived in Germany for six years. It was in this country where she wrote her first novel, Beyond the Horizon, in which she described the life of a young rural woman from Ghana in Germany. She returned to her country without publishing it, but a copy remained in Germany and an editor showed interest in it, which is why the first text was initially published in German.

After returning to Ghana, she wrote her next novel, Cobwebs (1996). Four years later, she published a book of short stories titled A Cross of Kind in Germany. In 2003, the Spanish translation of Más allá del horizonte (Beyond the Horizon) saw the light of day, and her books began to be translated throughout the world. That same year, a novel titled Faceless appeared in which the life of a middle class woman is intertwined with that of a homeless boy. Three years later, Not Without Flowers was published.  This novel is centred on the psychological difficulties faced by women in traumatic marriage situations.

Amma Darko does not consider herself to be a feminist writer, but she does see herself as an author whose main characters are women because she states that "she is more familiar with what goes on in a woman´s mind."

Sources:

• Casa África

• Author´s official web page

For more information:

• Interview in Elmundo.es

• Amma Darko, protagonista de Letras Africanas en Oviedo y Bilbao

• Casa África Reading Club: Más allá del horizonte (Beyond the Horizon)

• Consult the availability of books in the Casa África Mediateca (Media Library)