Zero: The Climate Race ‘Everywhere I looked, climate change bled’ Abi Daré on writing fiction: Imagine series
Mar 12, 2026
Abi Daré, British–Nigerian novelist and founder of the Louding Voice Foundation, discusses how climate change kept surfacing in her research and shaped her storytelling. She explains choosing a teenage narrator, research into drought-hit rural Nigeria, how fiction bridges city readers to rural realities, and the practical climate solutions and education efforts she’s seen.
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Climate Emerged From Research Not Agenda
- Abi Daré discovered climate change in her novel research when every line about poverty and inequality kept revealing climate impacts.
- A specific living-room moment made her pivot to center the story on how communities experience climate without the vocabulary to name it.
Farmer Conversations Shaped The Book's Details
- Abi watched local videos of drought-hit farmers and spoke with a farmer-activist whose crops shrank and who dug fruitless wells.
- She recounts a man saying if he digs further he'd 'hit the head of Satan', a vivid image she used in the book.
Climate Fiction Is Becoming Its Own Genre
- Abi argues climate fiction is nascent and often miscatalogued as dystopia, limiting reader recognition of the genre.
- The inaugural Climate Fiction Prize in 2025 signals the genre is becoming defined and discoverable.
