[7] Her first novel,[8] In Dependence, was originally published by Legend Press, London, in 2008,[9] and was chosen by the UK's largest bookstore chain as its featured book for Black History Month.
[10] In 2009, In Dependence, was published by Cassava Republic,[11] a literary press based in Abuja, Nigeria (as well as, latterly, in the UK), with a stable of authors that includes Teju Cole and Helon Habila.
"[12] Toni Kan writes in The Lagos Review: "Sarah Manyika has written an impressive debut novel which will find a well-deserved place in the pantheon of post-colonial literature.
"), NoViolet Bulawayo ("Astute, sensual, funny, and moving"), Jamal Mahjoub ("Manyika writes with great verve and gentle wit, illuminating her characters with subtle insight"), Peter Orner ("A beautiful, important new novel, and one that will continue to echo in a reader's mind for a long time after"), E. C. Osondu ("unforgettable...a powerful meditation on loss, memory, exile and loneliness.
The novel was also shortlisted for the California Book Award in the fiction category (alongside works by such writers as Andrew Sean Greer, Percival Everett, and Viet Thanh Nguyen).
[28] She has written book reviews for The Guardian,[29] among them on Glory by NoViolet Bulawayo,[30] and the New Statesman,[31] such as on Hitting a Straight Lick with a Crooked Stick by Zora Neale Hurston.
"[36] With a Foreword by Bernardine Evaristo, the book features activists, artists and intellectuals including Toni Morrison, Wole Soyinka, Michelle Obama, Cory Booker, Claudia Rankine, Henry Louis Gates Jr, Xoliswa Sithole, Anna Deavere Smith, Margaret Busby, Lord Michael Hastings and Evan Mawarire.
[38] A Brittle Paper review stated: "All through the book, there is a powerful sense of history as these figures look back, take stock, reminisce about their lives and how they came to make the impact that they did.
"[39] Olatoun Gabi-Williams writes of Manyika's book: "Her portraits of the chosen 12 are multi-media collages – richly hued stills in motion picture narratives.
...a snap-shot of where the peoples of the Black diaspora stand, today in the early 21st Century, and how much has been overcome to get here"), Delroy Lindo ("This is a one-of-a-kind book, a necessary and important one"), Ato Quayson ("A lesson in magic from Manyika's writing"), NoViolet Bulawayo ("Sarah Ladipo Manyika brings an intimate, eclectic, and delightfully startling freshness in this remarkably curated celebration of the African Diaspora") and Dame Vivian Hunt ("an amazing collection that will inspire readers young and old").