It's a play on words, really. The title I mean.
Dave and I were just in Sandwich 2 weeks ago spending the day and the description of the vacation cottages, etc is spot on. But it's also the main character being in the "sandwich" era of her life: aging parents and half-grown children, who are young adults with their own needs and issues. I highly recommend this story!
STORY SUMMARY
Rocky (Rachel) is married to Nicky and they have two almost totally grown up children: Willa, who is gay; and Jamie who has a girlfriend named Maya. Rocky and her family have vacationed on Cape Cod every year for 20 years. They look forward to it! They rent a very humble, little beach-town cottage and they've made memories and messes: emotional, marital, and because of the ancient plumbing, they've also had septic issues over the years. But the memories are sweet and they still all want to vacation together.
With this year's vacation, Rocky feels sandwiched in between her aging parents and her young adult children. It's going to be a great vacation, as always, but Rocky is also dealing with, at age 54, the symptoms and mood swings of menopause. Rocky's body is changing...and so is her life.
A chain of events bring Rocky into her past and she begins to relive not just the tender, poignant moments, but the sorrows a couple of long-ago summers when her children were preschoolers.
They are only on the Cape for one week...but in that week, everything is in balance, yet everything is in changing. Rocky learns some things about her own family's past and then she is forced to accept that she can't hide certain secrets any longer, especially from the people she loves.
MY THOUGHTS
This is a book with laughs, tears and many precious moments
I loved this book other than a few crass words and depictions as well as many editing errors.
The characters are richly developed and so real! I could relate to Rocky on so many levels except the hot flashes (I didn't get those during menopause).
The setting was so well described, I could smell the salt air and pines and feel the sandy shore under my toes.
The main themes in this story seem to be: physical and emotional changes in women; transitions of life and relationships; abortion; homosexuality; intergenerational dynamics/family dynamics; love, forgiveness, acceptance.
Some quotes that really resonated with me were all from the ending of the story:
"...that's part of choice--we get to make our own decisions, even if they're imperfect.The potential that you might regret something? We don't make anything illegal beause of that....." (pg 204 Sandwich by Catherine Newman c.2024
"Maybe grief is love imploding. Or maybe it's love expanding. I don't know. I just know you can't create loss to preempt loss because it doesn't work that way. So you might as well love as much as you can. And as recklessly. Like it's your last resort, because it is." (pg 220-221)
In my opinion, this book is appropriate for ages 17 and older (due to mature content).
On a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the highest, I rate this a 9.
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