Our Mothers Shadow

A secret society of women, borne of gender oppression and brutality in the form of forced female circumcision, existed for centuries in Africa. They arrive on American soil via the slave trade, adapting and ultimately thriving in the new world. Today, four young women, raised together within the society, try to fit in, however, their unusual upbringing, their entry into womanhood and the unorthodox manner in which they relate to the world around them marks them and, ultimately, takes a tragic toll on most of their lives. Ania, the most intuitively gifted, is the glue that holds the four together. Strange, conflicted, and unabashedly sexual, Ania must balance her desire to join the innermost circle of the society with a perverse rebellious streak, which makes her long for fulfillment in other areas of her life. Ania=s rebellious streak prompts her, as an adult attorney, to take a case defending a man accused of sexual contact with a minor female in the post‑Megan=s Law era. Ania doesn=t notice that a terrible storm is brewing within the societyCa storm which will plunge her headfirst into a whirlwind of events that will mark her life and very soul in a manner she never imagined possible.