J.R.R Tolkien, Terry Pratchett, Robert Jordan, Diana Wynne Jones, Robin Hobb, Nnedi Okorafor, H.P Lovecraft, N.K Jemisin, J.K Rowling, George R.R Martin… I could go on and on but the point I’m trying to make is every once in a while there comes around a writer who can barely be called that because the word itself doesn’t do the person who’s name is on marquee justice, because that person has such a visceral command of all things fantasy that it feels like they stepped through from a magical plain of existence simply to bless the world with fantastical mind bending stories. That is who Shanice Aaliyah Ndlovu is (I call her Vin), she is that next great legend of a writer and over the years to come I promise you she will be just as revered as the names at the top of this thing I write.. Now for you reading this and you haven’t read The Pride, please do, and I’m gonna tell you why (sorta) and do believe I will be long in the tooth with this “review”.
I’ve known some of the characters in The Pride for quite some time now, that said I’ll never forget the first time I read Cories and The Lost Maiden because of how it hit. It reminded me of the first time I read The Hobbit or Philosopher’s Stone it was knowing that I had just dipped my toes into an incredible world that would live in my heart and soul forever. Then I met more of her “children” as she likes to call her characters and became more enthralled, nay obsessed with her world, so you could imagine the pride I felt when Modjaji signed her and put her book out into the world. The command she has of the English language is beautiful, her magic system and it’s gods are luminous, her world is vast and raw in amazing ways, her characters painfully human and yet so much more than meets the eye. I’ve always called her the greatest writer of this generation and she always says she will do her damndest to prove me right. I now say read The Pride of Noonlay if you haven’t as yet and tell me I’m wrong in what I say (even if you say I’m wrote I’ll still say it)
– Quentyn Island.
The Island 