MECCA by Susan Straight

The title refers to a small agricultural town in southern California, inhabited by a number of characters in this book, along with their extended families.  The first such character is Johnny Frias, a highway patrolman, whose family has lived in California for generations.  Matelasse, originally from Louisiana, works in a flower shop, supports her two sons, and is separated from her husband, who wishes he were Brazilian.  Ximena works in a cosmetic surgery spa, and then later becomes the housekeeper for a very wealthy woman, who calls her “X.”  Ximena is an undocumented Mixtec woman from Oaxaca who speaks almost no Spanish.  The fly in the ointment for all of these characters is ICE—the acronym for the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency.  All of these characters are connected in some way, and this book is ultimately about family, whether blood-related or not.  One person’s problem or mistake becomes the entire family’s problem to solve; everyone has everyone else’s back.  Many characters have little to no relationship with their biological parents, and an “uncle” may have served as a father, even though he may be a friend of a relative, rather than an actual relative.  These relationships are hard to keep up with sometimes, and the cast of characters is quite large.  A character may appear briefly and then reappear in a more important role.  In other words, the plot is a rather intricate jigsaw puzzle, which I liked theoretically but found a bit challenging to piece together.