Set in late 16th-century Africa, India, Portugal, and Japan, The African Samurai is a powerful historical novel based on the true story of Yasuke, Japan’s first foreign-born samurai and the only samurai of African descent. Craig Shreve was born and raised in North Buxton, Ontario, a small town that has been recognized by the Canadian government as a National Historic Site due to its former status as a popular terminus on the Underground Railroad. He is a descendant of Abraham Doras Shadd, the first Black person in Canada to be elected to public office, and of his daughter Mary Ann Shadd, the pioneering abolitionist, suffragette, and newspaper editor/publisher who was inducted posthumously into the National Women’s Hall of Fame in the United States. Craig has a passion for extreme adventure, saying “I wanted to be a writer… but I felt that I did not have enough life experiences. I set out to rectify that, which led me to a passion for extreme activities – skydiving, hang-gliding, bungy-jumping, rock-climbing, caving, rappelling, Running with the Bulls in Pamplona, tobogganing down the side of a volcano, and sandboarding in the Atacama desert… I helped build homes in Honduras, Kenya, Guatemala, Paraguay, Nicaragua, Chile, El Salvador, and Bolivia”. Craig lives in Toronto.

Craig’s appearance is supported by Author Patron Sharon Hamilton.

Appearing in 6. The African Samurai