ISBN 9781928215806
ePub ISBN 9781928215813
Pages 250
Dimensions 210 x 140 mm
Published 2019
Publisher Modjaji Books, South Africa
Formats Paperback, eBook

The Unfamous Five

by Nedine Moonsamy

Seeking adventure during the school holidays, five teenagers from the Indian suburb of Lenasia accidentally witness a violent crime that has a lasting impact on their lives. Starting in June of 1993, the novel follows the Five through the next decade as they confront, both as individuals and as a group, questions of who they are, who they are allowed to be, and who they are expected to be in the New South Africa. They must query what role they will allow tradition, ancestry, sexuality, skin colour, love, money and culture to play in their lives as they attempt to forge new paths, sometimes stumbling along the way, but always willing to give one another a helping hand.

The Unfamous Five was a finalist in the 2021 NIHSS Awards

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Reviews

“Moonsamy steers skilfully through the vicissitudes of friendships and growing up in an unequal society. Both robust and tender...a wonderful debut.“

ZOË WICOMB

“At the heart of Nedine Moonsamy’s remarkably assured debut novel, The Unfamous Five, is a story of friendship. Moonsamy shows a deft narrative hand unfolding the bonds and tribulations of a tightly-knit group of Gen-Xers from the formerly Indian township of Lenasia as they negotiate early adulthood and its compromises in post-apartheid South Africa. Moonsamy writes an admirable clean, crisp sentence and in The Unfamous Five she has produced a thoroughly modern, honest novel that is both entertaining and illuminating.”

PRAVASAN PILLAY

About the Author

Nedine Moonsamy

Nedine grew up in Mosquito Valley, Lenasia and has lived in places as far flung as Helsinki, Poona and Makhanda since then. Currently, she lives and works in Pretoria, where she lectures on postcolonial literature in the English Department at the University of Pretoria. She also researches contemporary South African literature and science fiction in Africa. The Unfamous Five is her debut novel.

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