Sandwich by Catherine Newman

Sandwich by Catherine Newman

240 pages

Published June 2024 by HarperCollins

Publisher's Summary: 

From the beloved author of We All Want Impossible Things, a moving, hilarious story of a family summer vacation full of secrets, lunch, and learning to let go.

For the past two decades, Rocky has looked forward to her family’s yearly escape to Cape Cod. Their humble beach-town rental has been the site of sweet memories, sunny days, great meals, and messes of all kinds: emotional, marital, and—thanks to the cottage’s ancient plumbing—septic too.

This year’s vacation, with Rocky sandwiched between her half-grown kids and fully aging parents, promises to be just as delightful as summers past—except, perhaps, for Rocky’s hormonal bouts of rage and melancholy. (Hello, menopause!) Her body is changing—her life is, too. And then a chain of events sends Rocky into the past, reliving both the tenderness and sorrow of a handful of long-ago summers.

It's one precious week: everything is in balance; everything is in flux. And when Rocky comes face to face with her family’s history and future, she is forced to accept that she can no longer hide her secrets from the people she loves.

My Thoughts:

This one has already been added to my top books of 2024; if I rated books, this one would be a five-star read. I can't remember the last time I raced through a book to which I could so relate. Newman understands what it's like to be a woman of a certain age, what it's like to be in a decades long marriage, what it's like to be a mother and the daughter of aging parents. 

"And this may be the only reason we were put on this earth. To say to each other, I know how you feel. To say, I understand how hard it is to be a parent, a kid. To say, Your shell stank and you're sad. I've been there." 

Rocky loves her kids beyond measure; adores her parents; still yearns for her husband;  treasures the week at the beach the family spends every year in no small part because of the wonderful memories. But she still vividly remembers how hard it was to mother two small children, especially during those weeks at the beach. She gets frustrated with little things her parents do. And she finds herself constantly angry with her husband; even knowing that menopause is causing a lot of that, she can't help but wonder if their marriage has not run its course. 

The book is broken into the days of the week of one year's trip to the beach, but we see an entire lifetime and into the future. Newman packs a lot into this book (parenthood, marriage, sexual identity, aging, secrets, communication) and in other author's hands, I would say it was too much, that they had tried to cover too much territory. Here it absolutely worked for me, I think because I could see that week as a lifetime condensed into a short novel. Newman made me laugh, she made me cry. Mostly she made me think and appreciate how much she understands. 

On mothering young children:

"They say that having a child is like agreeing to let your heart walk around outside your body. But really your heart escapes from your body directly into the jaws of a lion. It's nothing you would ever agree to. I loved Jamie and Willa so excessively. I was so tired. I lay awake at night, and fear was the drumbeat soundtrack of my insomnia. When I heard stories about women driving themselves and their children off cliffs or into oncoming traffic, I thought, Yeah, I get that." 

Of course the vast majority of us wouldn't do such a thing. But all mothers have experienced the deep exhaustion of raising young children, the way it feels like it will never end. Even with help, most of us have probably experienced the thought that we just might not be cut out for parenthood. 

On loss:  

"What does loss look like, in your body? It feels like an air bubble stuck in your psyche. It feels like peering down into a deep hole. The vertigo of that. The potential for obliteration. It's in your stomach. Your spleen. Or it's just your heart losing its mind."  

Oh, yes! That's exactly what it felt like when I lost my mom - but I didn't have the words until I read this book.  

On menopause:  

"Menopause feels like a slow leak; thoughts leaking out of your head; flesh leaking out of your skin; fluid leaking out of your joints. You need a lube job, is how you feel. Bodywork. Whatever you need, it sounds like a mechanic might be required, since something's seriously amiss with your head gasket." 

Funny, but also so true.  

On aging: 

"Activities that might injure you include ping-pong, napping and opening a Greek yogurt. Your hairline is receding in such a way that, in certain cropped photographs, you look like somebody's cute, balding uncle...You have under-eye bags. Jowls. I Feel Bad About My Neck makes total sense as a book title."

I went to bed feeling just fine four months ago. When I woke up in the morning, I had terrible back pain. And because I'm getting to be of a certain age, I just assumed I'd slept wrong. Also because I'm of a certain age, I'm still having that battling that pain...with no idea how I even hurt myself. 

Having a family is not for the faint of heart. Being married is not for the faint of heart. Getting older is not for the faint of heart. And Catherine Newman knows that and knows exactly how to put all of it into words. I know these characters, I can relate to Rocky. I'm so grateful to Ann Patchett for recommending this book.  

 

 

Grief Is For People by Sloane Crowley

Grief Is For People by Sloane Crosley

208 pages

Published February 2024 by Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Publisher's Summary: 

How do we live without the ones we love? Grief Is for People is a deeply moving and suspenseful portrait of friendship, and a book about loss that is profuse with life. Sloane Crosley is one of our most renowned observers of contemporary behavior, and now the pathos that has been ever present in her trademark wit is on full display. After the pain and confusion of losing her closest friend to suicide, Crosley looks for answers in philosophy and art, hoping for a framework more useful than the unavoidable stages of grief.

For most of her adult life, Sloane and Russell worked together and played together as they navigated the corridors of office life, the literary world, and the dramatic cultural shifts in New York City. One day, Sloane’s apartment is broken into. Along with her most prized possessions, the thief makes off with her sense of security, leaving a mystery in its place.

When Russell dies exactly one month later, his suicide propels Sloane on a wild quest to right the unrightable, to explore what constitutes family and possession as the city itself faces the staggering toll of the pandemic.

Sloane Crosley’s search for truth is frank, darkly funny, and gilded with resounding empathy. Upending the “grief memoir,” Grief Is for People is a category-defying story of the struggle to hold on to the past without being consumed by it. A modern elegy, it rises precisely to console and challenge our notions of mourning during these grief-stricken times.

My Thoughts: 

"Grief is for people, not things. Everyone on the planet seems to share this understanding. Almost everyone. People like Russell, and people like me now, we don't know where sadness belongs. We tend to scrape up all the lonely, echoing, unknowable parts of ourselves and drop them in drawers or hang them from little wooden shelves, injecting our feelings into objects that won't judge or abandon u, holding on to the past in this tangible way. But everyone else? Everyone else has their priorities straight." 

Do we, though? Don't we all really love our "stuff," especially the things that tie us to another person? When Crosley's apartment was broken into and all of her jewelry stolen, the thief stole not just some jewelry, but pieces that tied her to her grandmother (although that was a complicated relationship, to say the least) and to Russell (one of the first things he noticed about her was her jewelry). Even the chest she kept her jewelry in was an antique that Russell had talked her into buying. 

People she knew didn't seem to understand the depth of the pain Crosley experienced with the loss; perhaps that's the experience of a city of people who live with a certain element of crime to which they've become accustomed. But I felt like I understood the pain Crosley experienced with the break in. She had not only lost her belongings, but her sense of safety and, by the way they handled the break in, her sense of comfort in the police. 

Exactly a month later, her best friend committed died. Russell didn't just die; he committed suicide. She'd lost her friend and was left wondering what she had missed and what she might have been able to do if she'd noticed the signs. And then came the pandemic. 

I wouldn't say I loved this book; but I did appreciate Crosley's writing and it left me with some things to think about. 

"Anger is a cousin of intelligence. If you are not revolted by certain things, you have no boundaries. If you have no boundaries, you have no self-knowledge. If you have no self-knowledge, you have no taste, and if you have no taste, why are you here? Russell taught me that. He taught me to be selective about who I jumped for and how high."

Life: It Goes On - November 17

Happy Sunday! We have had so many grey, overcast days of late - I'm so happy to be sitting at the windows with the sun shining in this morning. I'm hoping it lasts so I can enjoy being outside for a while today. 

Ever had one of those "quick" tasks that turn into an hours long battle? Yesterday I was going to put another leaf into the dining room table, in preparation for Thanksgiving, only to discover that I couldn't get the table open wide enough. Called in Big Guy. No luck. Flipped the table over (no easy feat!) to see if we could figure out what the problem was, which caused me to decide that I needed to clean the bottom of the table. We kept trying things then walking away in frustration. Finally got it to slide open, hours after we started. And this is how whole days get away from me! 

Last Week I: 

Listened To: Charles Frazier's The Trackers (loved it!) and started Gregory Maguire's Wicked, before I go to see the movie. I have it on my Nook, but knew I wasn't going to get it read in time so I bought it from Chirp, not knowing that you can only listen to books you buy from them on their app. Fine, whatever. Except that this morning, when I pulled it up to listen, it had lost my progress and started from the beginning. Ugh! 

New sunglasses - how fun 
are these?! 

Watched: Nothing unusual. What we didn't watch was the news. 

Read: Mrs. Sherlock Holmes for book club Tuesday. 

Made: Cinnamon monkey bread and a version of lasagna so I could use up some things in the fridge and freezer. This week has continued to be about getting things used out of the freezer so that there's been room for the food for Thanksgiving week. 

Enjoyed: Dinner and some shopping with friends last night. 

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This Week I’m:  

Planning: On painting our back hall and doing touch up painting throughout the house, having the carpets cleaned, and hanging some new curtains. Who wants to come for Christmas so I have an incentive to keep knocking out projects I've been meaning to get to for a long time?! 

Thinking About: Final meal plans for next week, what serving pieces I will need, what needs to be done in the guest rooms before guests begin arriving, what cleaning still needs to be done. My brain is an even crazier place than usual these days! 

Feeling: So excited...and a little disappointed. My kiddos arrive in eight days! Unfortunately, it looks like Ms. S may not be able to come so we won't all be together, after all. 

Looking forward to: Book club this week. 

Question of the week: I keep hearing about people who can have their house ready for company with ten minutes warning. Are you one of those people? If not (and you're like me), what things do you try to get done in that ten minutes to make as much impact as you possibly can? 

Long Island by Colm Toibin

Long Island by Colm Toibin

Read by Jessie Buckley

9 hours, 40 minutes

Published May 2024 by Scribner

Publisher's Summary: 

Eilis Lacey is Irish, married to Tony Fiorello, a plumber and one of four Italian American brothers, all of whom live in neighboring houses on a cul-de-sac in Lindenhurst, Long Island, with their wives and children and Tony's parents, a huge extended family. It is the spring of 1976 and Eilis is now forty with two teenage children. Though her ties to Ireland remain stronger than those that hold her to her new land and home, she has not returned in decades.

One day, when Tony is at work an Irishman comes to the door asking for Eilis by name. He tells her that his wife is pregnant with Tony's child and that when the baby is born, he will not raise it but instead deposit it on Eilis's doorstep. It is what Eilis does-and what she refuses to do-in response to this stunning news that makes Tóibín's novel so riveting and suspenseful.

My Thoughts: 

I was first introduced to Colm Toibin when I read his book, Brooklyn, and it was there that readers first met Eilis Lacey and Tony Fiorello. I looked back at my review to that book to see if my feelings now about that book mirrored what I'd felt about it when I first finished reading it. They did. But I found something interesting in that review. I remarked that: Time moves at quite a pace in Brooklyn; Toibin bypasses long periods of time between episode and vignettes. Here, it felt very much the opposite. This is not a book that spans years, but rather weeks. But things also remain very much the same: Nothing showy or lush about Brooklyn. All of the emotion is just under the surface and yet it is palpable and the characters are believable and realistic. 

What would you do if you found yourself in Eilis' position? She has told Tony she will, under no circumstances, raise his child by another woman and she does not want it raised in the family. Unable to get confirmation from Tony that she won't have to see the child, she leaves for Ireland, ostensibly for her mother's upcoming 80th birthday. Although she hasn't been home in decades, there's a part of Eilis that longs for the place where she most comfortable; it certainly isn't on Long Island, surrounded by her Tony's extended Italian family where she still feels like something of an outsider. 

All of that contributes to what happens in Ireland when Eilis is encounters Jim, the man she fell in love with when she was last in Ireland and whom she left behind to return to Tony (who she was already secretly married to). Once again Eilis is torn between the settled life she has and the dream of a deep love she finds in Ireland. What might happen between Eilis and Jim is complicated by the fact that Jim is already engaged to one of Eilis' old friends and the arrival of Eilis' children, who have never met their Irish grandmother. 

There are a lot of twists and turns to this one and it is, to a great extent less about Eilis than was Brooklyn. Still, I enjoyed getting to know Jim and Nancy better and to get an even better look at Eilis' relationship with her mother. We spend a lot of time wondering if Eilis will, once again, return to Tony or will, this time, stay in Ireland. Still trying to process how I feel about the end of the book and if you look at other reviews, you'll find I'm not alone. 

I very much liked that Nora Webster (of Toibin's title by the same name) appears in this book, as Eilis' mother did in that book. Jessie Buckley's reading of Long Island is spectacular. I highly recommend listening to this one. Like Brooklyn, this one would make a good book club selection, as there is a lot to process here. It's appearing on "Best of 2024" lists, although, to be honest, I'm not sure it will make mine. I'm sure that has more to do with me than others giving Toibin the accolades he deserves for his body of work. 

Mini-reviews: The Hazelbourne Ladies Motorcycle and Flying Club by Helen Simonson and Learned by Heart by Emma Donoghue

The Hazelbourne Ladies Motorcycle and Flying Club by Helen Simonson

Read by Fiona Hardingham

15 hours, 20 minutes

Published May 2024 by Random House Publishing Group

Publisher's Summary: It is the summer of 1919 and Constance Haverhill is without prospects. Now that all the men have returned from the front, she has been asked to give up her cottage and her job at the estate she helped run during the war. While she looks for a position as a bookkeeper or—horror—a governess, she’s sent as a lady’s companion to an old family friend who is convalescing at a seaside hotel. Despite having only weeks to find a permanent home, Constance is swept up in the social whirl of Hazelbourne-on-Sea after she rescues the local baronet’s daughter, Poppy Wirrall, from a social faux pas.

Poppy wears trousers, operates a taxi and delivery service to employ local women, and runs a ladies’ motorcycle club (to which she plans to add flying lessons). She and her friends enthusiastically welcome Constance into their circle. And then there is Harris, Poppy’s recalcitrant but handsome brother—a fighter pilot recently wounded in battle—who warms in Constance’s presence. But things are more complicated than they seem in this sunny pocket of English high society. As the country prepares to celebrate its hard-won peace, Constance and the women of the club are forced to confront the fact that the freedoms they gained during the war are being revoked.

My Thoughts: 

Simonson's Major Pettigrew's Last Stand was one of my favorite books the year I read it. One of the things I liked about that book was the way Simonson dealt with racism and classism in England. She touches on that same topics here and I would very much have liked to see more of that. Instead, Simonson tried to work in a lot of different themes, including, of course, women's rights, domestic abuse, and the effects of war on those involved and those at home. It felt, to me, like a bit too much and sometimes felt like Simonson wasn't sure which theme she really wanted most to emphasize. 

I did like a lot of the characters and the setting; but I'm still not, weeks after finishing the book, sure if I liked the ending. One thing I really didn't like was the reading (sorry, Ms. Hardingham) - some of the female voices really grated on my nerves. It's a nice time capsule of a place in time and would probably give book clubs a lot to talk about. 

Learned By Heart by Emma Donoghue 

Read by Shiromi Arserio

8 hours, 50 minutes

Published August 2023 by Little, Brown and Company

Publisher's Summary: Drawing on years of investigation and Anne Lister’s five-million-word secret journal, Learned by Heart is the long-buried love story of Eliza Raine, an orphan heiress banished from India to England at age six, and Anne Lister, a brilliant, troublesome tomboy, who meet at the Manor School for young ladies in York in 1805 when they are both fourteen.

My Thoughts: 

As with most (if not all?) of Donoghue's books, this one is based on real people. I first became aware of Anne Lister when I watched Gentleman Jack on HBO. Lister was dubbed the "first modern lesbian" and is well known because of the diaries she left behind, which included the story of her relationship with Eliza Raine, a young woman with a British father and Indian mother who was orphaned and sent to an English boarding school, where she met and fell in love with Lister. As tough as it is to be a gay young person in these times, imagine what it was like for young people in the early 1800's. 

The book is made up of third party narratives the girls' school days together and letters from Raine to Lister as an adult. Raine is a patient at an asylum and we slowly realize, as the book goes on, that she is much more disturbed that we at first realize. Much emphasis in placed on the other girls at the school, perhaps to emphasize how quickly Lister was able to ingratiate herself with them, despite being a rebel, and how much Raine's  dark skin kept her separated from the others. The book picked up for me in the end, as Raine's writing became prevalent. Interesting, but not my favorite of Donoghue's works. 

Life: It Goes On - November 10

Happy Sunday! It's finally clear and sunny here today after almost a week of grey skies and rain. Hoping it will help lift my mood; it's been a tough week. Fortunately we are a little over two weeks from having my kids arrive from Alaska, so I have that to look forward to and it's really helping my mood...and keeping me motivated. Keeping US motivated; Big Guy is knocking off to-do's as well. 

Last Week I: 

Listened To: Charles Frazier's The Trackers and I am absolutely loving it so far. If I stopped reading it right now, it would make my top ten list for the year. 

Watched: Some of season two of Shrinking, some football, a fair amount of volleyball, and now some college basketball. 

Read: Mrs. Sherlock Holmes by Brad Ricca for book club this month. 

Made: It was soup week last week. I made loaded baked potato soup and hamburger soup. Sent some hamburger soup home with Mini-him yesterday because I am incapable of making soup for a family of two; I've adapted to cooking for two in many ways but not when it comes to soup. 

Enjoyed: Dinner out with friends Friday night. 

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This Week I’m:  

Planning: Guys, I knocked out a ton of work in the basement yesterday. It looks so much better and is so much cleaner. I'm hoping to make even more progress this week, while I'm on a roll. Also, we went and looked at countertop options Friday and are making plans for some big changes in our kitchen. I'm so excited by that; but also super nervous, not wanting to make choices that I end up not loving. 

Thinking About: Thanksgiving menu - with a lot of people wanting to contribute, we are going to have a lot of food and I'm trying to figure out how to have it all ready at the same time, dishes for all of it, and how it's all going to fit on the table and buffet. 

Feeling: So mixed. Trying to focus on what's right in front of me for now. But also making a plan for the future and how I'll be involved. 

Looking forward to: Another quiet week. 

Question of the week: Where do you stand on cranberries? I feel they are either a love them or hate them kind of food. I love them at Thanksgiving, made from real cranberries; but the rest of the year, I'm a fan of the canned version without any chunks of actual fruit in them! 

***This week's book reviews are all historical fiction. That' right, I said "reviews!***

Hello Beautiful by Ann Napolitano

Hello Beautiful by Ann Napolitano

Read by Maura Tierney

15 hours, 6 minutes

Published March 2023 by Random House Publishing Group

Publisher's Summary: 

William Waters grew up in a house silenced by tragedy, where his parents could hardly bear to look at him, much less love him-so when he meets the spirited and ambitious Julia Padavano in his freshman year of college, it's as if the world has lit up around him. With Julia comes her family, as she and her three sisters are inseparable: Sylvie, the family's dreamer, is happiest with her nose in a book; Cecelia is a free-spirited artist; and Emeline patiently takes care of them all. With the Padavanos, William experiences a newfound contentment; every moment in their house is filled with loving chaos.

But then darkness from William's past surfaces, jeopardizing not only Julia's carefully orchestrated plans for their future, but the sisters' unshakeable devotion to one another. The result is a catastrophic family rift that changes their lives for generations. Will the loyalty that once rooted them be strong enough to draw them back together when it matters most?

My Thoughts:

As much as I've been on the struggle bus with my reading, I've been even worse with writing reviews. I drafted this right up to this point on October 9, almost a month ago. This one has proved especially difficult, as I've struggled with figuring out how I felt about this book. If you check out reviews on Goodreads, you'll find that other people have no such problem - they generally either really dislike this one (and think the characters are one-dimensional) or they absolutely rave about it (and it's fully-developed characters). 

Here's What I Liked: 

• I always like a story about families, especially the relationship between sisters. Here Napolitano draws from the characters of Louisa May Alcott's Little Women in creating these sisters and their close bonds. And, like that book, while their father is a great influence, he, too, inhabits very little of the book. But Rose is no Marmee. She is determined that her girls will all go to college so that they have control of their own future and won't have to rely on a man, which is admirable enough...until things don't go Rose's way. 
• The focus might be on the sisters, but William was my favorite character. A man whose parents all but ignored him, so deep in their grief were they over the death of their 3-year-old daughter, William is lost in his life until he finds he has a skill playing basketball. He's so skilled, in fact, that he gets a college scholarship to play and it's here that he finally finds his family, both the one that he will marry into and the circle of friends who will be there for him for decades. When Julia decides that he's the man that she can mold to give her the future she wants, one filled with stability and status, he's happy to have someone guide him and to become a part of the Padavano family. Except that what Julia wants for him begins to make William so miserable that he eventually breaks. Healing him causes a rift that will take two decades to resolve. 
• The basketball. So unexpected that the minutiae of this sport would play such a significant part in a family saga. This sports fan enjoyed it. 

What I Struggled With:

• The book begins in the late seventies and spans a quarter of a century. But it reads much more like a book set in the 1940's, 1950's. It made some of the things that happened or descriptions of events or clothing feel jarringly out of place. 
• I really, really did not like Julia. I understood why she craved stability and status, but she was so rigid in her vision of it that she completely misread William and reacted so poorly to his collapse. And then I felt like the rift that came between her and the rest of the family was largely on her - I understood her being upset, but not that she was never able to forgive the person she had most loved in the world. It caused her daughter a lot of confusion and, in the end, anger. 
• I didn't care for the way the rift was resolved between Julia and Sylvia and even less for the way Julia's daughter finally met her family. Although so many others felt that the ending was a real tear-jerker. 

This would make a good book club selection as there is a lot here to discuss and many themes to talk about, including loss, mental health, expectations and dream, betrayal, secrets, family relationships. 

Life: It Goes On - November 3

Happy Sunday! Now, I shouldn't be complaining about the rain and drizzle we've had for days (we were desperately in need for it), but I'm so excited to see the sun coming out just now. I'm usually more productive when the sun is shining, although I did get a ton done yesterday on a grey, dreary day so maybe the sun just is better at getting me up and moving. 

We've reached that time of year when Big Guy has to mow the lawn several times a week just to grind up leaves. Trying to make myself appreciate the blanket of colors and crunch as I walk through the leaves, but I'm already bemoaning the fact that the trees will soon be bare for five months. To help alleviate that, I took Halloween down immediately and began decorating for Thanksgiving, which I am so looking forward to this year! 

Last Week I: 

Listened To: The Paris Bookseller by Kerri Maher, a book about Sylvia Beach who founded the famous Shakespeare and Co bookstore in Paris. 

Watched: A fair amount of sports, some Food Network, and some Bridgerton. I really haven't enjoyed this season much more than I did season 2; I need to find a new "guilty pleasure" watch to replace it. 

Read: Ugh. Still in something of a rut when it comes to physical books (or ebooks, for that matter). I will finish Sandwich, by Catherine Newman today and I'm hoping to get my reading mojo back once we're through the election. 

Made: We ate out and ate leftovers from eating out four nights this week so did almost no cooking...again. I did make homemade mac and cheese and today I've got a pot of chili on the stovetop. 

Enjoyed: Celebrated my birthday Monday with my dad and a pizza and our anniversary Wednesday at one of our favorite places (my seafood risotto was to die for!), and Friday we went to hear one of our friends playing a solo gig at a local brew pub. 

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This Week I’m:  

Planning: Yesterday I spent hours working in my office, being ruthless in trying to get things to a manageable amount. Even so, it's still packed but it looks so much better. This week still need to get into the closet in that room and finish it up. Is it anything anyone else will ever see? No. But I'll feel better knowing it's done. Then it's down to the basement to continue that job. There will almost certainly be someone sleeping down there come Thanksgiving; as it is now, I'd have to insist they slip down there blindfolded. 

Thinking About: Painting, remodeling the kitchen, rearranging my bedroom...the list goes on. Will I ge to all of that any time soon? No. But at least some of it will happen soon and that will keep things moving forward. 

Feeling: Better today than yesterday - I had, as expected - a reaction to the Covid vaccine I got on Friday. Fortunately, it didn't set in until later in the day and I slept it off. Unfortunately, I didn't walk up yesterday speaking Russian, as predicted by a coworker. I mean, how cool would it be to just walk up and speak another language without spending years learning it! 

Looking forward to: Thanksgiving and a trip after that to visit my aunt and uncle. I wanted to be able to help them with some things but also I needed to give myself something to look forward to after the kids all leave. 

Question of the week: I'm working on a menu for Thanksgiving. What's the one thing your family must have for the Thanksgiving meal? I've got two pescatarians coming this year so I think salmon will be on the menu...do I still do both turkey and ham?