Pearls on a String: One Woman’s Journey to the Past
by Martha Andrea Aas

(published by the author, 2007)

From the back cover:

A fascinating and exotic coming of age memoir…

The daughter of Danish missionaries, as a child in the late 1940s the author accompanies her parents to Aden, in Yemen, where they try unsuccessfully to convert Muslims to Christianity. Her outer world becomes a rich riot of vivid sensory experiences as she navigates her new home, but her inner world is just as psychologically rich and complex. As she comes of age she begins to experience her sexuality, a frightening tendency towards depression, and the seeds of compassion which foretell her future life as a doctor and volunteer physician in Cameroon.

”Beautifully written, Pearls on a String is not only an amazing tale of a bygone time and place, but also a deeply moving and honest search for self.“
— Paulette Bates Alden, author of Crossing the Moon