The Pull of the Stars

 I was wary of reading [a:Emma Donoghue|23613|Emma Donoghue|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1591714728p2/23613.jpg]'s [b:Room|31685789|Room|Emma Donoghue|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1472239721l/31685789.SX50.jpg|9585076] because I dislike books or movies about people trapped in confined spaces. Fortunately, Donoghue knew that about me and much of the book takes place elsewhere and I ended up liking it very much.
[b:The Pull of the Stars|55867890|The Pull of the Stars|Emma Donoghue|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1620708581l/55867890.SX50.jpg|76322248] is very different but has several similarities. It too takes place in a small space and there are just a few characters. But the writing is gripping in a way that made it hard to put down, which is such a tired marketing cliché that I was surprised to find myself thinking it.
 Bare bones main plot: The narrator is a thirty-year-old Irish nurse in a small maternity ward during the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918 who tends to expectant women who also have the flu. Donoghue submitted the manuscript in 2020, meaning it was conceived of and nearly all written before the current pandemic, meaning that Donoghue has so much luck that I'm going to ask her to buy Powerball tickets for me. She did heaps of research and besides being a terrific novel in its own right, you'll be stunned by how many parallels you'll find between then and now.
 Two things: One, I know it's just text, but some of the descriptions of the medical stuff are not for the squeamish. Two, she doesn't use quotation marks when people speak. I've heard that this annoys some people, but it didn't bother me at all and Donoghue does it so artfully that her prose flows so well you barely notice it.
 The paragraphs are very short, which usually gives a staccato effect I dislike and wouldn't be right for this book, but that doesn't happen for some reason.

 Delia Garrett made a new sound, a low growl.
 I asked, Ready to bear down next time?
 She nodded furiously.
 I took the inhaler out of her hand; I needed her alert.
 It only struck me now that, unlike the proper hospital beds up in Maternity, these camp cots had no rails at the bottom. Nothing for it but to have Delia Garrett lie the other way.
 Could you spin around, dear, and put your head at the end of the bed for me?
 How's that going to help?
 I stood her pillow up against the headrest. When the pang comes, jam your left foot against this and push, all right?
 I wrenched the blankets and sheets out of the way so she could rotate herself. I looped a long roller towel around a bottom corner of the metal cot and set it in her hand. Pull hard on this too.
 Delia Garrett gripped the towel, her breathing harsh.
 I pulled up her nightdress and bent her right leg up in my lap to get a good look.