Dr. Pamela Mariva Mshana is an international award-winning playwright, author and educator. Her novel, girls in search of cover, part 1 was an International Books Award final. Part 1 is the first book in a series that examines the lives of three generations of Black women scarred by rape and racism.

The young heroine, Carmia Evans-Pullen, is a troubled young African-American girl whose drug-addicted mother relocates Carmia and her brother to Bovina, Mississippi—a deeply religious backwater where they all move in with Carmia’s grandmother, Ma Evans. Carmia grows up an outsider in Bovina, except for gaining the attention of her first crush, Joseph.

Mother Johns (Joseph’s grandmother) a conniving church leader with a dark hatred for Ma Evans, convinces their community that Ma Evans’ entire bloodline, including Carmia, is cursed. As a young girl wrestling with sexual trauma and church hurt, will Carmia’s hope to regain her sense of purity be reached?

Will the voices of her ancestors, (a spiritual cloud of witnesses) give her strength enough to escape the inherited dysfunction of her mother and grandmother? girls in search of cover—part 1 explores these questions and sets the stage for riveting challenges that Carmia must continue to overcome in the second book, girls in search of cover— part 2.