Missing Pieces

Recently released a new novel by young author Karma Shouman, Missing Pieces, A tale of love and self discovery by Al Kotob Khan for Publishing Cairo, March 2025 When Cairene teenagers Talia and Malek start dating, their worlds transform. As Talia struggles with PTSD triggered by the relationship, her close loved ones help her cope with trauma caused by sexual assault, peer abuse, parental abandonment, loss, struggles with self-harm, and bullying. While Talia’s supportive relationship with Malek empowers her to confront this difficult past, it also facilitates dependencies and activates fears of abandonment that weigh heavily on the relationship. As Malek plans to move abroad for university and becomes increasingly encumbered by his own challenging circumstances and history, the relationship falls apart, and Talia must learn to face the world alone. Missing Pieces is a raw and brave teenage novel about all the intensity of leaving behind the pains of childhood and adolescence and becoming an adult able to stand on one’s own two feet. Malek and Talia’s story, told in the fresh global and tech-centric English language of Gen Z, takes on shifting gender norms, migration, family dynamics, cultural hybridity, and trauma from the fresh perspective of an exceptionally young author. Talia’s story, however, is also a unique and definitively contemporary contribution to the diverse global world of coming-of-age novels.