Breaking the Maafa Chain
Breaking the Maafa Chain chronicles two sisters' struggle for true freedom in the mid-nineteenth century, when transporting slaves from Africa to America was an illegal but lucrative business
Nineteenth century—Two sisters, Fatmata and Salimatu, are captured and sold separately into slavery. Forced to change their names to Faith and Sarah, they end up in two different countries with opposite slavery laws. Faith ends up in America, where slavery is still legal and slaves don't have any rights. Sarah ends up in a Victorian England and as the goddaughter of Queen Victoria. Can the two sisters reclaim their freedom and identity in a world that is trying to break them down and mold them to its coloniser's will?
Based on the true story of Sarah Forbes Bonetta, Breaking the Maafa Chain will take the readers on a journey of loss, survival, hope, identity and tradition.
Anni Domingo is an Actress, Director and Writer, working in Radio, TV, Films and Theatre after training at Rose Bruford College of Speech and Drama. She appeared in Inua Ellam's 'Three Sisters', a play set in Nigeria during the Biafran War, at the National Theatre (UK) and toured Robert Icke's 'The Doctor' to Australia early in 2020.
She currently lectures Drama and Directing at St. Mary's University in Twickenham, Rose Bruford College of Speech and Drama, Students and at RADA. Anni's poems and short stories are published in various anthologies and her plays produced in the UK.
An extract from her novel Breaking the Maafa Chain won the Myriad Editions First Novel competition in 2018 and is featured in the New Daughters of Africa (2019) anthology edited by Margaret Busby. Anni recently won a place at Hedgebrook Writers Retreat and Norwich National Writing Centre's 'Escalator' programme enabling her to start working on Ominira, her second novel.
Her first novel, Breaking the Maafa Chain, is scheduled to be published in 2021 by Jacaranda.