Birthing Pangs takes place in New Orleans in the late 1970s. It sheds light on the distinctive artistic, spiritual, cultural and intellectual life of a New Orleans Ninth Ward society that is seldom revealed. Set in the fertile ground of the African American Civil Rights Movement's aftermath and the shadows of the feminist movement, Birthing Pangs tone is prolific. The main characters include Matia, a Tulanian, young accountant and an aspiring confectionary chef distressed by her difficulties in owning up to her own desires; the man of her dreams, Nile, a philosophical plumber in the midst of his own evolution; Matia's dutiful father, Franklin, a principled and headstrong contractor and businessman; Matia's friend Binta, a meek and talented seamstress who is focused on becoming a wife; and Shallow, friend of Matia and a Xavier University pharmacy intern who is stanchly against marriage.