SANDWICH

by Catherine Newman

This book makes important the "ordinary" world of a mother-wife-daughter, which is great. On the surface, it's a humorous account of a week in Rocky's life on holiday with her grown-up children, long-suffering husband and parents—all squished into a tiny vacation house in Cape Cod. Written from her POV, we experience the microcosms of Rocky’s emotional world, made humorous—but to us older readers also more real—by the fact that she's mid-menopause and struggling with changes to her body and identity, and the grief that comes with that. The writing is heartfelt to the point of gushing, funny, and peppered with the word "like" which I struggle with, but it’s still a lively and energising read that made me pause to appreciate some of the minutiae of my own life.