Ake Arts &
Book Festival
19-21 November, 2026
Now in its fourteenth year, Aké Arts & Book Festival has brought together over 1,000 writers, poets, musicians, actors, filmmakers, artists and thinkers to celebrate creativity, network and share stories. This year, the festival returns with a fantastic programme of events including panel discussions, book chats, poetry and music. Join us for three days of cultural immersion!
Ake Arts &
Book Festival
2026 Theme | NATIVE INTELLIGENCE
Long before the algorithm, there was the elder and the proverb. Native Intelligence sits at the crossroads of what we have long known and what the machine is only now learning to mimic.
Across the continent, artificial intelligence is reshaping how stories are told, how elections are fought, and how truth itself is reported. Yet beneath the noise, other ways of knowing persist, carried in language, in ritual, and in our communities.
Festival Books 2026
BOOK SPOTLIGHT
LEAVE YOUR
MESS AT HOME
By Tolani Akinola
The Longe siblings are really botching their parents' American Dream. Sola Longe, eldest daughter, estranged from the family, is secretly back home in Chicago for the first time in a decade. She’s a newly single and recently disgraced influencer trying to quietly put her life back together again. The other three Longe siblings aren't doing much better. Anjola is in love with her best friend, who just got engaged to someone else; Karen, a college junior and the baby of the family, is grappling with her sexuality and self-image; and Ola, the golden child with a baby of his own on the way, is questioning his marriage and how to raise a Black son in America.
Sola’s unexpected return sets them on a crash course towards each other, and when the four siblings find themselves together again at their Nigerian immigrant parents' Thanksgiving table, a decade’s worth of secrets and a lifetime of resentments explode to the fore. In the wreckage of their fateful reunion, each Longe is forced to reckon with the past, take stock of what really matters, and find a way back to each other. Big-hearted, hilarious, and wise, Leave Your Mess At Home is a poignant exploration of forgiveness, unconditional love, and becoming who you want to be, asking the question: what do we owe to our families, and what do we owe to ourselves?
Watch on-demand
Interview | Bernardine Evaristo
From the 2025 Festival
Book Chat | Mrs Kuti
From the 2025 Festival
Panel Discussion | Whose Truth Is It Anyway?
From the 2025 Festival
Music | The Recurrence
From the 2025 Festival