Wreck 
By Catherine Newman
Harper, October 2025, 224pp.

The Short of It:

A standalone story but one that brings back a beloved character from Sandwich.

The Rest of It:

Rocky is back.

In Newman’s previous book, Sandwich, Rocky and her family spent the summer in Cape Cod. An iconic, idyllic setting. I fell in love with that book and that family.

In Wreck, Rocky and the fam are back two years later, at home doing the things every family does but in a totally Rocky way. Rocky way? Rocky is a character. She is the type of person who says what you are quietly feeling. Honestly, she is a lot like me. I just blurt out my thoughts for all to hear. Most of the time with dead accuracy. Much like Rocky.

This time around, the story is centered around home and some irritating medical challenges that Rocky faces. An unknown rash, slowly taking over her body. Her internal dialogue about said rash, and the doctors who keep bouncing her back and forth between specialists is what women of this age go through daily. Ahem, myself.

Rocky has no filter. If you enjoy that kind of thing then this is the book for you. She talks about her day in a very witty, self-deprecating way. It’s often laugh out loud funny. As she goes about her day, and the many doctor’s appointments that follow, she thinks fondly of her adult children and reminisces about when they were younger. It’s what we do.

There’s not a lot of plot. You need to know this going in but it’s comforting in a way that visiting with an old friend is. Dealing with every day trials in the form of laughter and snippy comebacks. My only complaint with this story is that it ended abruptly. There didn’t seem to be a lead up, I just turned a page (on my device) and boom, it ended.

Episodic is a good way to describe these books. I like them and I recommend them both. They could each be read as a stand-alone.

Source: Borrowed
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