Sacrament

by Susan Straight

Centered around a group of nurses in San Bernardino during the first year of a pandemic, acclaimed author Susan Straight weaves a love story between the women and their forged community—a community beset by extreme heat and great change, yet one they’ll risk their lives to protect.In August 2020, four women are nurses working in the ICU at a San Bernardino Hospital at the height of a COVID surge: Larette Embers, whose husband Grief is an Animal Control officer, whose son Dante is obsessed with astrology; Cherrise Martinez, whose husband died years ago in a car crash, whose daughter Raquel has been sent to Coachella to live with her great-aunt in the date gardens to avoid the virus; and two traveling nurses, Pam Ott from Indiana, and Marisol Manalang, born in the Philippines but living in Sacramento.

To safeguard their families, the nurses have moved into RVs close to the hospital, living side by side, working, eating, sleeping as close as sisters. They share food and cigarettes while they care for each other, yet often keep their work experiences private. They are a community in crisis at the height of a pandemic, assisting strangers at the edge of death with infinite tenderness and desperation.

Genres: Fiction, Literary Fiction, Historical Fiction, Contemporary, Audiobook, Adult Fiction

352 pages, Hardcover

Published October 28, 2025

About the author

Susan Straight's newest novel is "Between Heaven and Here." It is the last in the Rio Seco Trilogy, which began with "A Million Nightingales" and "Take One Candle Light a Room." She has published eight novels, a novel for young readers and a children's book. She has also written essays and articles for numerous national publications, including The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, The Nation and Harper's Magazine, and is a frequent contributor to NPR and Salon.com.

Her story "Mines," first published in Zoetrope All Story, was included in Best American Short Stories 2003. She won a Lannan Literary Award in 2007. She won a 2008 Edgar Allan Poe Award for her short story "The Golden Gopher."

She is a Professor at the University of California, Riverside and lives in Riverside, California.

Reviews

[Michael -- Justice for Renee & Alex · Rating 5 out of 5]

Our Angels Who Suffered

Publishers have been avoiding the trauma of the pandemic, sensing that the pain is still too raw for readers– a reluctance reminiscent of the post-Vietnam era. However, Susan Straight's powerful novel, “Sacrament” unflinchingly examines the invisible toll the pandemic inflicted on essential workers and their families.

While many of us were fortunate enough to remain secluded and avoid public spaces, confronting the challenges of isolation, our "essential workers" faced a starkly different reality. Author Susan Straight, who lived near a hospital—a major site of suffering during that period—spoke often with nurses who relayed the constant, unrelenting misery of every shift. These individuals stood as the heroes on the front line of this war.

Straight's powerful work, "Sacrament," focuses on the lives of three ICU nurses—Larette Embers, Cherrise Martinez, and Marisol Manalang—during the COVID-19 pandemic. To shield their families from the virus, these nurses lived in close quarters, enduring stifling conditions in trailers near the hospital. This necessary separation meant they were isolated from their loved ones and also prevented them from sharing the daily, agonizing realities they faced: witnessing patients, friends, and neighbors die alone. A particularly moving element of the story involves Larette singing to comatose patients. These were songs requested by the patients' loved ones, offering a final, remote connection—a form of sacrament in place of last rites—at a time when the pandemic's end seemed impossibly far off.

A major plotline is the disappearance of Cherrise’s 15-year-old daughter, Raquel. After running away from the Coachella date farm where she was staying, her absence requires a search involving California Highway Patrol officer Johnny Frias, a character who also appeared in Straight's previous novel, "Mecca." Raquel is desperate because she has been unable to reach her mother and, in defiance of her mother's explicit prohibition against contacting her, fears that her mother might be succumbing to COVID-19. Her desperate search is a mirror of the nurses' isolation—it highlights how the pandemic fractured essential human connections.

Susan Straight's novel, "Mecca," was my favorite book of 2022. With “Sacrament” she continues her powerful exploration of overlooked communities and the lives of those who inhabit Southern California, a hallmark praised by the Los Angeles Times when it proclaimed her 'the bard of overlooked California'.

“Sacrament” is an emotionally profound and critically acclaimed work that provides an unflinching look at a harrowing historical period. It grounds the immense tragedy of the pandemic in the immediate, visceral details of the nurses' restricted lives, women who were denied the option of isolation. By transforming the clinical isolation unit into a space that is both sacred and agonizing, The collective trauma of the pandemic finds a devastating, personal voice in the lives of Larette, Cherrise, and Marisol. It is a terrifying, beautiful novel that insists we not look away. Straight performs a kind of final ritual for this terrifying moment. This book solidifies her standing as one of our most vital chroniclers of contemporary American life.

Thank you to Catapult, Counterpoint Press, and Soft Skull Press and also to Edelweiss Plus for providing an advance reader copy in exchange for an honest review. #Sacrament #EdelweissPlus

[Thomas · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked that this book highlighted the experiences of nurses and first responders during the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Susan Straight does a great job of harkening back to a devastating and bewildering time and showing these characters’ fortitude even in difficult circumstances. Unfortunately I give this book only three stars because the writing style was quite slow for me; the prose just felt too uniform and one-dimensional, even across scenes of different emotional intensity. Even though there were multiple main characters their voices all blended together too much for my liking. Respect to Straight for the message of this novel even if the execution didn’t work for me.

[Meike]

I have family members who worked as nurses and doctors during the pandemic, so let's check out this book!

[Novel Visits · Rating 4 out of 5]

@counterpointpress | #gifted Do you ever have expectations for a book that get in the way of your enjoyment? That’s what happened to me initially with 𝗦𝗔𝗖𝗥𝗔𝗠𝗘𝗡𝗧𝗦 by Susan Straight, but I’m happy to say I overcame those early doubts. The blurb for this book describes it as being about a group of nurses in San Bernardino, CA during that first summer of COVID. To keep their families safe, they live in small trailers not far from the hospital where they work long brutal shifts. That was all a big part of this story, but there was so much more and at first all the rest threw me. In fact, I almost stopped reading. That would have been a mistake. ⁣
⁣
𝘚𝘢𝘤𝘳𝘢𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵𝘴 turned out to be such a rich story exactly because it was more than just about the nurses. It was also about their families, their children, their friends, their community, their patients, and yes, the nurses themselves. At the heart of the story were cousins Larette and Cherrise who’d grown up together and ended up in the same career, nursing.That brought them both to the front lines in the unknown territory that was trying to save lives in that horrifying first year of the pandemic. Their jobs were not the only COVID related issues that were part of this story. That’s where the friends and family came in.⁣
⁣
This book was a little like stepping back in time to an era we all remember, but sometimes wish we didn’t. I realize that for some readers, the book will be a hard no, but I’d encourage you to consider it with an open mind. Like other collective tragedies (WWII, Vietnam, 9/11), that time is a piece of our shared history. Yes, parts were difficult to read, but it was the overall humanity that shone through. That’s why, in the end, I really liked this one. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⁣

[Maureen Grigsby · Rating 4 out of 5]

This novel was different than I expected, but it tells the story of several Covid 19 nurses and the impact of caring for patients on their families, the patients, and themselves.

[Jan · Rating 4 out of 5]

The pacing was a bit uneven, but I love Straight’s world of working class characters navigating the first years in of the Covid 19 pandemic in the inland regions of Southern California.

[Melony · Rating 5 out of 5]

Highly recommend.
Great book about families, the ones we have & the ones we make.

[Salty Swift · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tale of nurses looking after Covid patients in a small California town, as seen through their eyes and those close to them. There are passages here that hit so close to home, that bring back such dire memories of that phase that one wants to look away. There is absolutely no doubt, the nurses that stayed and soothed the sickest patients and saw them through their passing were the real heroes.

[Linda Rae · Rating 2 out of 5]

As much as I enjoyed Mecca, this sequel/continuation did not resonate with me. The COVID scenes at the hospital were very touching, the farming scenes felt realistic but the book itself felt overly dramatic in parts and boring in others. It was very uneven and I was glad to be done with it.

[Craftyrose · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow

What a beautiful story. So many layers. So much love. This is a book that is going to stay with you for days because there's so much in it for you to unpack and think about.

Nursing family is unlike any other family because you deal with life and death all the time. So many people on the precipice of falling And never coming back or turning over and living a whole new life again.

[Jan Pitts · Rating 3 out of 5]

This author is new to me and I thought the subject would appeal as I am a nurse. I simply don’t like her writing and had difficulty with the flow. Not for me.

[Booknblues · Rating 4 out of 5]

book:Sacrament|224082456] by Susan Straight tells the story of nurses living on the front line fighting Covid in 2020. Because of its subject matter it may be too painful for some to revisit. I know there were moments in this book that I had difficulty with.

The nurses live in small trailers provided for them to live in away from their families. We see how they and their families cope. Straight tells a gripping story of the families during this fraught time.

Larrette and Cherrise are cousins who have been through everything together but they never imagined they would be nurses fighting in the frontlines against Covid nor what this would ask of their families.

The story tole in third person shifts perspective between characters but with Johnny Frias a CHP officer it is told in first person. Apparently Johnny was the main character in Mecca (which I have not read.)

I found the book moving and would recommend it to any who can get past reliving 2020. I might also recommend reading Mecca first, although I haven't read it but want to now.

I would and want to read more by Susan Straight as this is the first one I've read.

[Cindy · Rating 4 out of 5]

A COVID novel about hard-working nurses during lockdown, staying in a temporary trailer park to keep their families safe. The novel focuses on how they cope with the distancing, the deaths, and the despair of not knowing when it would end. One major storyline concerns a single mother and her high-school-aged daughter, now separated by a 2-hour drive and lockdown protocols, only able to Zoom when the mother's work breaks align. Another nurse sings to the departing whose loved ones are unable to be at the bedside. It's heartbreaking yet also hopeful. There's a lot going on - perhaps too much - but I was left with an even deeper respect for the essential workers who kept things going and for the sacrifices they made.
My thanks to the author, publisher, @RecordedBooks, and #NetGalley for access to the well-narrated audiobook of #Sacrament for review purposes. It is now available.

[Mary · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hoping there will be a sequel to this book. I loved it. Hard to explain why. I took two years of Spanish in high school, and can usually understand what is written, but I kept grabbing my iPad and using the translation app!

[Liz Willard · Rating 3 out of 5]

Will it ever get easier to read a book about Covid? This is an important one, giving insight into the lives of nurses. Not an easy read. It’s written a bit poetically, which can be both beautiful but also vague. The focus on relationships is key.

[Courtney Whipple · Rating 1 out of 5]

I thought this book was going to be way different than what it ended up being. The author’s style of writing was extremely distracting for me and I couldn’t follow the characters and plot. There were so many times I wanted to DNF this book. I ended up skimming the last bit. Very disappointing!

[Julie Breslow · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book really captures the terror of the first year of the COVID pandemic. The writing was a bit stilted for my taste.

[Sheila The Reader · Rating 3 out of 5]

Set during the height of the 2020 pandemic in San Bernardino, Sacrament follows three ICU nurses whose lives intertwine as they balance compassion, exhaustion, and fear while caring for the dying. When one nurse’s daughter disappears, their world collides with a highway patrol officer’s search that exposes both love and loss amid a nation in crisis.

I listened to this one on audiobook thanks to an advanced copy from the publisher and NetGalley, and the narrators did an excellent job bringing the nurses and their distinct personalities to life. The story had moments that resonated, but I found that much of the focus was on small daily details rather than deeper character development, which made it harder to form a strong emotional connection to the people in it. The subject matter itself was heavy, revisiting a time that still feels raw for many of us, and that made parts of it difficult to read. The writing is skillful and clear, and I can see the author’s talent in how she captures place and tone, but this particular story didn’t completely land for me. I’d still be open to reading more of her work in the future.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the advanced copy of this audiobook in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

[Kristy Petzold · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 ⭐️. As a nurse, I wanted to like this more. On the other hand, not sure if I didn’t enjoy it more because that was a stressful blip in life

[thewanderingjew · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sacrament: A Novel, Susan Straight, author; Stacy Gonzalez, Marisol Ramirez, Shaun Taylor-Corbett, Jasmin Walker, narrators.
Nurses Larette and Charisse may be important characters in this novel, but it is their shared experience with family, patients, and others from diverse backgrounds, that were, and are possibly still today impacted by the Covid virus, that illuminates Covid’s ongoing effect on all of us. The interaction with Rachel, Charisse’s daughter and Grief, Larette’s husband, serves to add authenticity to this story as the ravages of the Covid pandemic on society continues even now. It is through these characters that we witness and remember Covid’s effect on all of our daily lives, as it forced necessary changes and challenges that everyone had to face.
Covid created anxiety. It emphasized the need to have a strong sense of devotion and loyalty to each other, in order to deal with the hoarding and scarcities of products to come, and the inevitable loss of loved ones. We would all have to face loss and grief. In the beginning, there was simply little that could be done to fight the disease. The” trial and error” approach, often resulted in errors. So, this is a heartfelt and often heartbreaking tale, but those of us still standing are filled with the hope of building a better future for all of us.
The author has exposed the details and the ramifications of the inadequate, often “fly by night” rules, and/or lack of them, developed in the earliest stages of the pandemic. Unfortunately, we were largely ignorant of the disease, and our understanding of how to treat Covid only slowly evolved. Kudos to the author for enlightening the reader, with such clarity, to the sacrifices made by the dedicated workers in the medical profession and also in the other essential service fields. These workers had to overcome their own fears as they faced their daily, traumatic experiences while they feared for their own safety and the safety of their families.
At a time of such a disastrous event like a pandemic, that threatened the continuation of our very existence on earth, the loyalty and courage of essential workers was often either ignored or unappreciated. Their job performance was often thankless. Their inability to save many victims was often cause for abusive criticism. The unreality that we all faced, of possible extinction, as we faced a danger that seemed beyond our control, created chaos in some circles of society; yet our dedicated professionals never seemed to give up hope or weaken and run from their responsibility to help those less fortunate, even when their own safety was threatened.
The author steered clear, for the most part, of politics, and instead concentrated on humanity and its ability to treat each other humanely. Responding to extreme measures, health care workers chose to remain and comfort the victims, helping the dying as they shuffled off this mortal coil without the benefit of their loved ones surrounding them. The morality of some of the choices made, by political entities and some in position of authority, was left out in this book. It was deemed to be a story for another day of judgment. For this book, we can only judge the devoted professionals and agree that they were angels of mercy. Although, some found this book slow in the beginning. I did not agree with that assessment. I was glad that my fear that it would become political was unfounded. It is a wonderful book and I highly recommend it.

[Topaz Wright · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5/5

I wanted to like this book SO bad. I met Susan Straight at an event for her previous book Mecca, and got to tell her personally how much I loved the book, especially of the brief portrayal of the nurses and the beginning of the pandemic. It hit home as a nurse who started working in 2020. She then told me that the next book would feature the same nurses more prominently! I was ecstatic! When signing my copy, she wrote that I was a “veteran”, which went straight to my ego. Naively, I wondered I would get a shoutout in the next book, although likely, at the time, it was effectively completed. There is an officer with my last name, though, which I thought was funny. Close enough, right?

The title of the book itself is meaningful. I received my degree at a Christian university, where it was drilled into us that nursing is a calling, a sacred work. In the real world, this is often used as justification to overwork and underpay nurses. I wondered if this concept would be explored. A poem of this name is read by the high school-age character, and it is briefly discussed by other students. I would have liked more of this.

Anyway, I have several nitpicks that dampened my enjoyment of the book. Cherrise’s daughter, 15 years old, is proud of knowing the word “orphan”? Cherrise’s sister doesn’t think to tell the daughter (or any of the adults taking care of her) that her mom is sick? Nurses are wearing surgical masks UNDER N95s? That defeats the point! N95s are supposed to make a seal on your face, and that won’t work with something under. Standards dictate men cannot even wear a beard with them.

I often have a hard time with suspension of disbelief in books, according to my roommate, and this book was especially difficult. I kept thinking, that’s not what that’s like, or it wouldn’t happen that way. I realize I’ve never read medical fiction before, and I know just a little too much to become fully immersed in the world Straight created. I recognize that my experience is not universal, and some nurses might have very well had the exact experience Straight shows. I also genuinely respect her for tackling such a recent, devastating time, when so many other authors and directors avoid it entirely.

However, I struggled to finish the book. The writing— short, choppy, sentence fragments— was grating to me. The multiple voices did not feel distinct to me. The pacing was odd. I feel like in her previous book Mecca, the disparate storylines came together nicely, whereas this one was not as satisfying. I often love stories that are less plot-heavy, but once the climax resolved, I wondered what else could happen in the last sections of the book.

Once again, though, the author’s love for the real-life setting shines through. The attention to detail, place names, and residents is immaculate. I could feel the oppressive heat despite reading this in January, and I could visualize the ranch, the date farm, and the suburbs, if not the hospital itself. Fortunately I have enough experience inside them myself. I would still recommend this book to anyone with an interest in the summer of 2020, when COVID nurses were still considered heroes, before the vaccines came out, and before conspiracy theories and indifference made everyone forget that the pandemic was ongoing.

[Matt B · Rating 5 out of 5]

I could smell the dates, and the chemical antiseptic of the hospital, and the alfalfa, and Cabron… and I could feel the way they felt… I could hear Larette singing to the patients, and feel the emotions she felt as their skin went yellow and their spirits, like smoke, drifted away…

This is what Susan Straight does. She doesn't simply write about a place… she puts you there.
Sacrament does what few pandemic novels have managed: it transforms the chaos and grief of 2020 into something warm, humane, and deeply rooted in place.

I thought I knew what I was picking up: grief, masks, ventilators, death. And yes, those things are here. But so is the desert heat. So is the strange intimacy of women living side by side in RVs, keeping each other upright through impossible shifts. So is the ache of a mother sending her daughter away to keep her safe, and the terror when that daughter vanishes.

Straight finds light in the bonds these women forge… bonds built on shared cigarettes, shared meals, and the unspoken understanding of what they witness each shift.

The narrative's structure mirrors the disorientation of that moment in time. Sometimes, I was confused by which characters perspective I was seeing and hearing from, or whose emotions I was experiencing…. but it somehow didn’t really matter… like, the total impact was so felt by us all… by each of them…. maybe in the way in which we were all affected by Covid, and by the changes it brought… and in that way, it felt wholly different than any book I’d ever read before…

Straight moves between perspectives and timelines in ways that occasionally left me working to keep the characters distinct—but perhaps that's the point. The pandemic made strangers of our neighbors and blurred the boundaries between days; Straight's fragmented approach feels less like a flaw than an intentional choice that honors that communal confusion.

Despite my own confusion, these nurses aren't abstractions or symbols of heroism… they're specific women with complicated histories, living… with children, absent husbands… When Cherrise's daughter Raquel disappears, the novel opens outward into a search that pulls in the wider community, revealing how crisis can both fracture and bind us. There's warmth in the way these nurses hold onto each other, in Johnny Frias searching for a girl who isn't his, in Grief's quiet devotion to Larette.

For me, it was a random selection from the library, chosen on a whim, but it feels like Sacrament is going to be hard to top for this year's reading… as I finished the last page, and turned to find that was all, I felt a pain of sadness and realized that was all I’d ever know of these people… just as quickly as they’d entered my life, they were gone….

I didn’t expect the effect, and right now I’m totally surprised by this book… and how it did so impact me… I closed this book feeling like I'd lived somewhere I'd never been.
I'm still thinking about it. Still hearing Larette's voice. Still smelling the dates.

Highly recommended.

[Carrie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Revisiting the pandemic while down with the flu was not the best circumstance for reading this book, but its light and outlook were soothing. It is August of 2020 and hospitals are still overloaded - at Our Lady in San Bernadino, CA the gift shop and chapel have been converted to bed space. The dedicated nurses working the ICU have moved into small RV trailers so they can stay on site and not have to worry about bringing the virus home. It also means they don't get to go home. There are about 5 that the story centers on, and two even more specifically who are cousins. Larette Embers is missing her husband and teenage son and Cherrise Martinez, who lost her husband in an accident years ago has just her teenage daughter Raquel whom she has sent to live with inlaws on a date farm near Coachella. Raquel is bereft, missing her mom and friends and in-person school. Both nurses get the virus at some point, so when Raquel doesn't hear from her mom, she makes the impulsive plan to hitch a ride with a local boy to come home and be with her. She goes missing for 2 days, adding to Cherrise's agonized worry and forcing her and Larette to reconsider priorities around family and work. There are lots of patient stories too - the medical professionals feel they are fighting an unacknowledged war and honestly, there must still be lingering trauma in the medical community for the complete overwhelm of death. Not having directly lived that aspect of it, I had forgotten the isolation and separation of families, the inability to visit the dying, families camping out in the hospital parking lot to be close, the Facetime and phone calls that nurses took on to connect people one last time. Larette, who has acting and singing experience has staarted singing a favorite song to the patients at death's door. The level of care and devotion in this book is the sacrament - honoring the life of a stranger at the expense of your own. The titular poem by Paulann Peterson also figures in. These are stories that need to be told, lest we forget.

[Melki · Rating 5 out of 5]

"You guys look up . . . You can see the fucking sky. We look down at the numbers on machines, and we look down at our phones 'cause the families want FaceTime, and we look down at the body."

Whew! This one brings back all the nightmares of the COVID 19 epidemic - gurneys filled with gasping patients lining the hospital corridors, exhausted doctors and nurses looking like they were serving in a war zone, makeshift morgues . . .

Meet four ICU nurses working at the San Bernardino hospital in 2020. They've been living in trailers near the hospital so they will not infect their families. Despite the strain of providing round-the-clock care for gravely ill patients, they hold it together by sharing their thoughts over cigarettes. Meanwhile their neglected spouses and kids are asking why they won't come home, and why they are choosing strangers over their own loved ones.

It's an intense, but ultimately fulfilling read.

I requested this from NetGalley because I read Straight's second book, I Been in Sorrow's Kitchen and Licked Out All the Pots and loved it. That was way back in the early nineties.

Now I'm going to have to catch up on all her books I've missed over the years.


Thanks to Counterpoint Press and NetGalley for sharing.


This is book 9 in the Ross Library Winter Reading Challenge - By An Author Who Was Active in Another Decade.

[D.J. Lang · Rating 3 out of 5]

This one I can write a bit more on since it was a book discussion group pick. We were asked to score it out of ten, and I gave it a 6 which sounds a bit better than a 3 out of 5. The scores in the group were 2.5, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 (haha, all over the place). We were reading this book about nurses during COVID 2020 right after reading The Women about nurses in VietNam so that possibly could have skewed some of the ratings.

I was intrigued by the story because I grew up in first Riverside County and then San Bernardino County. I have family members in all the first responder categories and blue collar categories. While I don't have family members in Indio, I know the desert areas of San Bernardino County as well as the canyon and ranching areas. All that to say, I had an interest in the land which I was told the author intended for it to be a story within the story (the book is also a county wide read in my current county).

I started out with the audiobook first, and I couldn't really keep the story fixed in my mind (this is usually the case with me and audiobooks); however, I'm glad I listened to the beginning because whoever did the singing for the audiobook can truly sing! The singing was lovely. That said, I did have an opportunity to read a hardbound book, and that's when I was able to get into the story. I think the book was worth reading and it was a good choice for the book group.

[Kathleen Gray · Rating 5 out of 5]

An amazing read. Set in Southern California during the height of COVID it's very much about family, the one we are born into and the one we make. And it's very wise. Cousins Larette and Cherrisse are working in the ICU and living in trailers three blocks from the hospital to keep their families safe. Larette's husband Grief is an animal control officer while Cherrisse is a widow who has sent her 15 year old daughter Raquel to live at her in-laws date farm to keep her safe. Then there's Johnny, Grief's friend who is a CHP officer and kinda cowboy. This winds between all of them over a period of weeks. Weeks when Raquel pines for her mother and ultimately goes missing for the family when she persuades Joey, who works at the farm to drive her back to see her mother. There are admittedly some terrible moments in the ICU but there are also moments of grace, especially when Larette sings to patients. The atmospherics are equally vivid at the date farm and at the ranch where Grief and Johnny wrestle an escaped bull back to a pen. I worry that this won't get the attention it deserves due to the topic but it's emotional, thoughtful, beautifully written and just terrific. Thanks to Edelweiss for the ARC. This is the first time I've read Straight and I'm going to look for her again. Highly recommend.

[Deborah · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have read every novel Susan Straight has written since her first was published in 1993, and they have all been exceptional, in my opinion. This newest one is another stunner, with a gripping, emotional story, utterly human and credible characters, and a vivid sense of place. (It puzzles me that she’s not better known and more widely read, but the taste of the reading public often baffles the heck out of me.) Some of the characters from her previous novel, Mecca, appear here (though there’s no need to have read that one to fully appreciate this), and we’re back in central California, in the area around San Bernardino. But this is summer 2020, which means Covid has shut everything down, and the story centres on two nurses, cousins, who are caring for the (far too often) dying people in the ICU and living in trailers near the hospital to prevent spreading the virus to their families. This has been going on for months by the time the story opens, and the nurses and their family members are starting to come apart at the seams. The story goes in really interesting directions, both inside the hospital and out, with big emotion and empathy. The author clearly cares for her characters, and I really did too. Highly recommended.

[Kate Belt · Rating 5 out of 5]

Possibly my best novel of 2025 (not counting rereads)! What a beautifully written and beautifully told story. It’s about Covid and is also a history lesson, with a strong sense of place, about the everyday lives of ranchers and farmers who have populated the San Bernardino, CA area for hundreds of years. This redemption story will break your heart! I can’t write a better description than this excerpt from the Washington Post Book Review “Sacrament is a rare novel that deepens the human drama of Covid . . . In populating Sacrament with a cast of Black, Mexican American, Indigenous and Filipina essential workers during the pre-vaccine days of Covid, Straight transcends the mundanity of Covid novels that have concerned themselves with upper-class social distancers . . . Straight’s reverence for the work of nurses is clear . . . writing directly from their perspectives, she avoids the saccharine tone of some appreciations . . . Sacrament is a deeply humane novel about the tenderness and heartache of caring for strangers, the misguided ways we try to protect the people we love the most by hiding our hardest truths, and the strength that can be found in community." I first learned about this book and this author in Library Journal’s Prepub Alert.

[Kendra Chura · Rating 3 out of 5]

This story was both a reminder and an eye-opener of what people went through during peak COVID.

Based on the description, it wasn’t exactly what I expected, but I still enjoyed it. The story follows not only the nurses but several other characters as well.

Each character in the audiobook had a different narrator, and I thought they were all great. There’s a bit of singing in this, and while she had a lovely voice, I really don’t enjoy singing in audiobooks.

What I didn’t love was how often it felt like hardships were being compared. Being an essential worker during the height of COVID would be hard no matter what. Obviously, the ER nurses were front and center, and it was clearly mentally and physically exhausting. But a few times it felt like they were arguing they had it worse—when no one was saying they didn’t—just that it was a hard time for everyone.

Overall, it was a good story. It was a bit slow at times, but it did keep my attention and the different narrators made it easy to follow each character.

Thanks to NetGalley and RB Media for the advanced listening copy.

[Allison · Rating 3 out of 5]

Set in 2020 when Covid was a new virus that was easily spread, making so many very ill, often taking lives and leaving others with long term symptoms. The nurses of San Bernadino Hospital must isolate themselves when not at work to avoid spreading the virus any further. The devastation of their pasts and all that they witness at work along with being isolated from their families, takes its toll of course. Much of the book explores the bonds that pull people together in the wake of tragedy. The characters move through grief, guilt and moments of grace that feel grounded and real.

There are four narrators of this audiobook. The narration is great although at some stages the pace seems very slow. The singing lines are lovely.
I found it a little difficult to follow in parts due to the shifts between timelines and perspectives. Despite the changing narrators, I think it may have been easier for me if I had read Sacrament in print.

Thank you to Netgalley and RB Media for the free audiobook in exchange for an honest review.