Life Is A Rollercoaster
Wreck by Catherine Newman, Review
Wreck by Catherine Newman, published in hardback in January by Transworld, Length: 256 pages (currently on sale in Waterstones, priced £13.99)
This is a follow up to Catherine Newman’s NYT bestseller Sandwich but can be read as a standalone novel. Full disclosure: I haven’t read Sandwich but hear excellent reports. This was such a soothing balm for the soul and the perfect antidote to (mad) current affairs. It gave me Nora Ephron vibes and praise doesn’t come much higher than that.
Thoughts and feelings: This is a heart warming, wildly funny and sometimes poignant exploration of family, seen through the tender hearted lens of Rocky, a strong middle-aged female protagonist experiencing modern anxieties with wit and vulnerability. It’s warm, achingly funny and highly relatable. Rocky joyfully leaps to life from the page in this layered, emotionally intelligent investigation of family, connection, and life’s upheavals, big and small. I laughed and cried at so many passages. It was uplifting, hilarious and real.
The Vibe: Rocky is kept awake by a mysterious skin rash and a local train crash has thrown her into a spiral of moral dilemmas and emotional chaos. Her daughter Willa is obsessing over the accident online, her son Jamie may be professionally entangled in it and all Rocky wants is for someone to call her back from Dermatology. A diagnosis is hard to pin down and Rocky navigates health anxiety, guilt, grief and the American healthcare system with a cocktail of medications, a sense of humour and the complicated and messy love of her adorable chaotic family.
Who will want to read this? This will appeal to readers who enjoy Ann Patchett, Elizabeth Strout, Meg Wolitzer, Emma Straub, Claire Lombardo and the OG Nora Ephron.
Final thoughts: I completely adored this character-driven, intergenerational family story, bursting with love, humour, pathos and unresolved emotional turbulence. Rocky is such a relatable, warm and honest protagonist. For a relatively small “slice of life” drama, there’s quite a lot going on here and I was swept away by Catherine Newman’s magical and immersive writing. I really couldn’t put it down and can’t recommend it highly enough.