 Hello, I'm Zena Badawi. I was born under the African sun in the Sudan but I was raised in the UK. Now I'm here on the slopes of Mount Kenya in the continent of my birth and this is one of the countries that is known as the Cradle of Humankind and yet it's ironic isn't it that although Africa has therefore got the longest history in the world this is a history that has been overlooked even denigrated or written by outsiders and that is why I wanted to write this book. It's the book I always wanted to read for myself, a comprehensive accessible history of Africa that is seared into the imagination so that it can be easily understood and therefore I focus on the figures the kings the queens the soldiers and the ordinary people who help shape the destiny of this continent. But this book is more than that it is an African history of Africa. Over nearly seven years I traveled to more than 30 African countries talking to dozens of historians, archaeologists, anthropologists, cultural experts and ordinary citizens telling me their history from their perspectives, their interpretations and so this book is a compilation of all that I have learned from these Africans. It is their history, it is my history and it is yours because there is nobody in the world today who cannot say that Africa is their mother continent. Africa's history is part of our global story and that is why I want to write this book.