MOTHERLAND, a journey through 500,000 years of African culture and identity

254pp., b/w & colour illus., map, paperback, Weidenfeld & Nicholson, London, 2025

ISBN: 9781398707375

Luke Pepera's account of African history and culture is interwoven with his personal experiences of exploring his Ghanaian family history.

"From prehistory to Black Panther, Motherland explores 500,000 years of African history to transform our understanding of this most remarkable and misunderstood continent. Through masterful storytelling Luke Pepera conjures vivid and colourful lands bursting with extraordinary characters and rich adventure. Epic yet intimate, bold but thoughtful, inclusive and revelatory: this is history at its best" Miranda Malins, author of The Rebel Daughter

" Luke Pepera's Motherland is a brilliant and wide-ranging study of African identity, told through the lens of the continent's unique culture and history. Crucially it reminds us that the darker episodes - the Transatlantic Slave Trade, colonialism and racism - occupy only a tiny portion of the timeframe, and that Africans were not solely their 'inevitable, unwilling and hapless victims'. A stunning debut." Saul David, author of Sky Warriors

Writer, broadcaster and historian Luke Pepera was born in Ghana. After graduating with a degree in Archaeology and Anthropology from St Peter’s College, Oxford, he has worked at the Pitt Rivers Museum, The Times, and Tatler, and has written and presented Africa: Written out of history, a documentary for History Hit.