Girl 11, writes book to champion inclusivity

An 11-year-old schoolgirl has written a book with a protagonist who has vitiligo to encourage young people to embrace inclusivity.

Difriendsity is Tiana Akoh-Arrey's second book and tells the story of a group of friends with a range of conditions.

"It doesn't matter how you look or how different you may be, you can still be friends, you can still love each other, you can still embrace each other," she said.

The young author, from Rugby, juggled writing the book alongside studying for exams and moving home.

The book's title was chosen by Tiana to highlight and celebrate the diversity often found in friendship groups.

Carla, the book's main character, has vitiligo, while Chris uses a wheelchair and Lisa is neurodiverse.

She added: "The book is not only about how people can look different but also how people can think differently as well.

"I added all these characters with different conditions to make people aware of them, so it is also educational for children, teenagers and anyone who reads it."

At the age of seven, Tiana, who attends Boughton Leigh Junior School, penned her first book called My Afro: Twin Best Friends, which celebrated her natural hair texture.

"We had lots of young black girls sending us messages saying thank you and my book really helped them," she said.

I was really happy that I managed to get people to come out of their shell and just be more confident in their heritage or their hair or their skin colour because that was the main audience for the story."

She now hopes to encourage others her age to pick up a pen.

"A lot of children have stopped reading and gotten into electronics so I think it's really important to give them the tools to write because it is really fun," she said.

"Once you get into it, it's almost as if you can't stop."

Dorothy Akoh-Arrey, Tiana's mother, said she was "so proud" of her daughter, who she said has had sponsorship from the Kelly Clarkson show and appeared on prime TV worldwide.

"It's incredibly inspiring because when Tiana did her first book, we sort of became accidental publishers," said the 42-year-old, adding that the book's success had made them "understand the impact of powerful positive messages through writing".

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