The Sheltered Pandemic Trilogy is about a group of neighbors in Oakland, California, and how they live through the events of the pandemic, and the other crises that marked 2020 and 2021. Sheltered, the first novella of the three, was written simultaneous to the events it describes, and provides an authentic window into what ordinary people were hearing and thinking about in March-May 2020.

In the spring of 2020 seven counties in the San Francisco Bay Area issue a regional stay-at-home order— and for millions, life changes overnight. In a quiet neighborhood in Oakland, Rachel and Carlos must navigate the most disastrous public health crisis in a century while keeping their new romance alive. As the pandemic rages across the world they realize their harmonious little block is not a refuge. In the midst of global chaos one community must work to mitigate despair and build optimism. Carlos and Rachel learn from their friends and family that building a better future begins at a local level.

Kathryn Kahn has lived in Oakland, California for 40 years, and is delighted to write stories that show the city's unique spirit. Before the three novellas that make up the Sheltered Pandemic trilogy, Kathryn's professional writing was functional, and she wrote for both nonprofit and for-profit companies, in industries ranging from technology to arts education and advocacy to government. She is now focused on fiction, with a goal of telling stories about ordinary people who confront big problems with a positive spirit.