Meet M. H. Ayinde, the author of A Song of Legends Lost, published on Jun 4 by Orbit in the UK.

She grew up in London’s East End, studied English literature, and spent years working behind the scenes in magazines, games journalism, and television. Her creative influences range from Studio Ghibli to martial arts, which honestly makes perfect sense. A Song of Legends Lost has that both mythic softness and some edge to it.

Song of Legends Lost is set in the Nine Lands, a world fractured by a thousand-year war. In this world, only nobles can summon their ancestors in battle. Temi is a commoner, as far from power you can imagine. She accidentally summons an ancestor. But, as you can imagine, not everything that can be summoned should be.

In this interview, she talks about some of the cool elements of the book. A key feature of the worldbuilding is the ancestral invocation, which is rooted in from Yoruba cosmology, though she has said that the idea was specifically inspired by Final Fantasy summons and Aragorn’s army of the dead scene in Return of the King. She shared on Instagram that there is also a significant influence from Filipino precolonial culture.

If you follow Ayinde on social media, which we highly recommend, you’ll know how open she has been about documenting her debut experience. The joy. The nerves. The whirlwind. One of our favorite moments is the photo of her sandwiched between stacks of her own book, wide-eyed, smiling, maybe a little stunned. There’s also a very sweet unboxing video where she meets the finished book for the first time. That moment is something we don’t celebrate enough: what it means to put years of your life into a story and then finally hold it in your hands.

She’s now a Sunday Times bestseller, which is huge. But what matters more is that she’s making fantasy feel new.

To support M. H. Ayinde, the first and best thing to do is buy A Song of Legends Lost now or as soon as you can. Also click on her bio link on Instagram for a full suite of ways to support, including links to events. Congrats to Ayinde!