In Mecca, her sensuously told eighth novel, Susan Straight entwines the lives of memorable characters in and around the eponymous Inland Empire town. There’s Johnny Frías, a California Highway Patrol officer, who is haunted by a secret—a violent encounter that happened years before. Single mother Matelasse Rodrigue is raising two young boys. And Ximena, undocumented, from Oaxaca, tries to avoid deportation. There are a host of others with whom these principal characters come in contact. While their lives are full of racism, work trouble, natural disaster, and encounters with law enforcement, they survive because of their deep community bonds. Straight wrote about some of these figures and their relatives in her novel in stories Aquaboogie and her most recent novel, Sacrament. Mecca is a finely woven social novel with plenty of drama and insight; it doubles as an unforgettable ballad to a vibrant, racially diverse place.
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