If you read Sandwich by Catherine Newman, her popular 2024 novel about motherhood, family, the passage of time and how to let things – and people – go, then you know exactly what you are going to get with her latest novel Wreck, which picks up the same characters two years later. Rocky’s mother has died, and her two adult children are now relatively settled. Like in Sandwich, not a lot happens in Wreck, other than Rocky’s elderly father now living with her, a somewhat mysterious car accident that has killed someone her son once knew, and a strange skin condition that might or might not be serious. The stuff of everyday life. Newman has a great ability to nail universal feelings but make it feel incredibly personal. The lack of momentum slowed this down a little bit for me, but I always found gems in Newman’s writing – and Rocky’s anxieties – that brought me back into the book.