Catherine Newman’s second novel for adults, Sandwich, takes place during a week on Cape Cod, a popular Massachusetts beach resort. Rachel, nicknamed “Rocky,” is a fiftysomething mother to two young adults, Jamie and Willa. She and her husband Nick have been renting the same cottage for their family’s summer vacations for 20 years. Although Rocky narrates most of the novel in the first person, in the Prologue she paints the scene for the reader in the third person: “They’ve been coming here for so many years that there’s a watercolor wash over all of it now … pleasant, pastel memories of taffy, clam strips, and beachcombing.”
Also present are Maya, Jamie’s girlfriend; Rocky’s ageing parents; and Chicken the cat (can you imagine taking your cat on holiday?!). With such close quarters, it’s impossible to keep secrets. Over the week of merry eating and drinking, much swimming, and plenty of no-holds-barred conversations, some major drama emerges via both the oldies and the youngsters. And it’s not just present crises; the past is always with Rocky. Cape Cod has developed layers of emotional memories for her. She’s simultaneously nostalgic for her kids’ babyhood and delighted with the confident, intelligent grown-ups they’ve become. She’s grateful for the family she has, but also haunted by inherited trauma and pregnancy loss.
There couldn’t be more ideal reading for women in the so-called “sandwich generation” who have children growing towards independence as well as parents starting to struggle with infirmity. (The contemporary storyline of Barbara Kingsolver’s Unsheltered, which coincidentally is about a character named Willa, is comparable in that respect.) Newman is frank about Willa’s lesbianism and Rocky’s bisexuality, and she doesn’t hold back about the difficulties of menopause, either. Rocky is challenged to rethink her responsibilities as a daughter, wife and mother when she’s surrounded by equally strong-willed people who won’t do what she wants them to. The novel is so quirky, funny and relatable that it’s impossible not to sympathize with Rocky even if, like me, you’re in a very different life situation.
I like the U.S. cover so much more!
One observation I would make is that Rocky is virtually identical to Ash in Newman’s debut, We All Want Impossible Things, and to the author in real life (as I know from subscribing to her Substack). If you read even the most basic information about her, it’s clear that it’s all autofiction. That’s not an issue for me as I don’t think inventing is inherently superior to drawing from experience; some authors write what they know in a literal sense and that’s okay. So, for her fans, more of the same will be no problem at all. But it is a very particular voice: intense, scatty, purposely outrageous. Rocky is a protagonist who says things like, “How am I a feminist, an advocate for reproductive rights, Our Bodies, Ourselves, hear me roar, blah blah, and I am only just now learning about vaginal atrophy?” (A companion nonfiction read would be Nina Stibbe’s Went to London, Took the Dog.)
In outlook Newman reminds me a lot of Anne Lamott, who is equally forthright and whose books similarly juxtapose life’s joy and sorrows, especially in this late passage: “this may be the only reason we were put on this earth. To say to each other, I know how you feel.”
This is a sweet, fun, chatty book that’s about a summer break – and would be perfect to read on a summer break.
With thanks to Anne Cater of Random Things Tours and Doubleday for the free e-copy for review.
Buy Sandwich from Bookshop.org [affiliate link]
I was delighted to help close out the blog tour for Sandwich. See below for details of where the other reviews have appeared.
Bookish Beck = Rebecca Foster. American transplant to England. Freelance proofreader and book reviewer.
Bookish Beck 
Only yesterday, I got this from the library – I’d reserved it. Looking forward to seeing how my impressions will compare with yours.
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Enjoy! I imagine it will make you think back to the relevant point in your life.
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I’m expecting so
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Skimming your review as I’m running my own next week but suffice to say I loved this one. I’ve not yet read her debut but will be putting that right shortly.
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I always admire an author who can balance the tone between joy and sadness; it can’t be an easy thing to do.
Molly Wizenberg put up a lovely interview with her: https://mollywizenberg.substack.com/p/all-of-this-is-precarious-and-none
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This actually sounds fun – I like the sound of the protagonist from your made-up quote!
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Oh, that’s a direct quote; let me go change the lead-in so that’s clear! (I am not so clever a mimic.) I know the voice won’t be for everyone but if you enjoyed the quotes then you would probably like it.
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Thanks for the blog tour support x
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You’re welcome! And thanks as always for your hard work and getting great books in our hands.
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I’m looking forward to this one (loved her last). Interesting how the different covers alter my expectations – the burnt toast looks edgier, funnier, whereas the beach house cover feels far more like ‘women’s fiction’ (not a label I use but I understand what it applies to…because they’re not always the books I would pick up!).
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I didn’t like this quite as much as her debut, but since you enjoyed that you will find this of a piece.
The cover difference is notable here. It took me ages, like literally until this week, to notice that the burn pattern on the toast is in the shape of a bikini. Before that I thought it was quite a generic image, only using food to connect back to the cover on her previous book (which in the UK had a slice of lemon tart on a broken plate and employed similarly bright colours and stark design). Newman does write a fair bit about food, in her fiction and on her Substack, so that’s appropriate. Although the beach house scene on the U.S. cover is fairly standard, I like the perspective, the sans serif font doesn’t scream ‘women’s fiction’, and the quote from Ann Patchett is a good sign.
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I feel like this says a lot about the quality of your toaster. 😉
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We love our four-slice toaster but actually it might be on the blink: the left-hand side pops up again almost immediately, while the right-hand side tends to burn things.
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It’s going onto my list to look out for. Sounds a good summer read.
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A bookish gal’s beach read.
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I think this one sounds good and I like the idea of an older female protagonist.
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The author Antonia Honeywell was asking on X, where are all the stories about older motherhood (as opposed to new motherhood) when your parents are also ageing, etc. and I recommended this!
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I think this sounds very appealing!
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It would resonate with your situation to an extent, and I know you love your beach vacations!
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But does the cat survive?
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Yes, the cat is fine. There’s a short epilogue set a year later and they’ve acquired an “overlap” cat in case Chicken dies. I like that term and will be borrowing it. We think we should get another cat or two before Alfie gets much older.
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Phew: good to know!
And I vote for an Alfie-companion.
We’re voting, right?
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He will NOT be happy about it, so we have to wait until he can’t do much to protest. And make sure that it’s not a kitten who will really annoy him.
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[…] Bookish Beck, one of the trusted readers I mentioned, has reviewed Sandwich as part of the blog tour. You can read her review here. […]
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[…] Although the forms differ, a common theme – as in the other June releases I’ve reviewed, Sandwich and Others Like Me – is grappling with what a woman’s life should be, especially for those who […]
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So, my husband is actually from Sandwich . . . I’m so curious about how this novel paints the town (which has changed so much even in the [comparatively] few years I’ve visited it).
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Ha, how did I not even know that Sandwich was a town name?! That means it’s a triple pun from clever Newman. She has a surf shop and a sandwich shack and a couple of overpriced seafood restaurants as locations, but I’d say mostly we just stick to the beach and the family’s vacation home.
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Hi-I’m from Sandwich and I think your husband would agree if he read the book that it does NOT take place in Sandwich. I picked up the book solely to see how my town was represented (full disclosure: I’m not the target demo for this book nor do I enjoy this genre) and was disappointed to find that the nameless town is clearly inspired by Wellfleet or Eastham or a town further down Cape. I’m relieved that most readers haven’t realized that Sandwich is a real place (yet), as that would lead to false assumptions about my beautiful and historic home that’s much more than a vacation destination for New Yorkers.
…and since I’m here, I have to do my people justice… it’s ON Cape Cod, not AT, and it’s not just a popular beach resort.<3
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[…] by Catherine Newman [28 Oct., Transworld / Harper]: This is a sequel to Sandwich, and in general sequels should not exist. However, I can make a rare exception. Set two years on, […]
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[…] also, reviews by Bookish Beck, A Life in […]
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[…] Catherine Newman’s third novel, Wreck, a winsome sequel set two years on from Sandwich, a family encounters medical uncertainties and ethical […]
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