Welcome to Litsy!

This short book packs a lot of emotion! Rocky and her husband and two adult children are vacationing on the New England shore for a week. Her menopausal experience and memories of having and raising the kids blend with what they are all going through in the trip to create a whole atmosphere. There isn‘t a plot to speak of, but if you‘re around her age you‘ll likely relate to the bulk, even if you didn‘t have kids. Excellent.

Every year for 25 years at least 15 members of the family-my kids, aunts, uncles, grandbabies-spend a week at the ocean in the same funky house. So much of this book reminded me of the type of stays that we have. (Although I have to admit that we have some grumpy times which this author did not replicate.) I break my days down the same way she does. (Monday I‘m so relieved that we have so much time and by Wednesday I start to get sad.) 🔽

My May #Bookspin and #Doublespin. I hope I‘ll have time to get to both of them. The next two months are going to be very busy.

I‘m at almost exactly the same stage in my life as Rocky, the narrator of this story but I just can‘t relate to her at all. She was so appallingly needy. Her constantly overflowing emotions were tiresome & her suggestion that her calm & steady husband & son didn‘t have feelings seemed just plain cruel. But I enjoyed the bright & breezy writing that brilliantly evoked the atmosphere a summer beach holiday. A low pick.

I really enjoyed this slice of life family story. Being close to the MC's age, there was quite a bit I could identify with.

26/80

April #BookSpin @TheAromaofBooks

#ReadingMyTBR #Reading2025 @DieAReader

I loved this book SO much! It just felt like such a real account of a family‘s life. Audiobook was excellent!

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

"Picture this: a shorelined peninsula jutting into the Atlantic Ocean."

#FirstLineFridays
@ShyBookOwl

Current audiobook… Needed something a little bit less intense 😅

Starting my April #BookSpin

I‘m not sure how I feel about this book…I mean, I liked it but something about it also grated on me but I can‘t say exactly what. I kept going back and forth between liking the MC and not liking her. A low pick!

#bookspinbingo
#pop25 - book that features a character going through menopause

A great book, including love and grief, our family ties and memories of times past. Some profound insights mixed with sandwich fillings

#catherinenewman #menopause

I loved this book! It‘s about a family on summer vacation at Cape Cod, told from the perspective of the mom. The title references how she feels “sandwiched” between her young adult children and her aging parents. The characters grapple with things like menopause, sexuality, pregnancy, marriage, and more. I thought the writing was very witty, the topics were dealt with well, and the setting was a taste of vacation. Good book!

I expected to really relate to the MC here but I didn‘t like her much. It may be that the book was too much in her head. She was way too involved with her kids. I understand it was partly about having to let go and find your role once your kids were grown, but it didn‘t fully work for me.

My 4 choices this month. I fiction, 1 non-fiction, 2 historical fiction mysteries

I wish I could have loved this one! I DID love the first 2/3 so much, where I found myself identifying SO HARD with the simultaneous exhaustion and joy of motherhood and the conflicting feelings of watching your kids grow up to be successful and great and then moving out.

But I was so disappointed by the last 1/3. All of Rocky‘s issues and feelings just got to be too much. In the end I found her unbearable and I felt sorry for her poor husband.

This book captures all the emotions of this specific phase of life. It was perfection.

It was wonderful to immerse myself in the Cape Cod world of sun, sand, salt air, ocean breezes, picnics on the beach, sticky fingers, wet bathing suits,towels with their seaweed smell flapping on a clothesline, & family love & acceptance, while outside in my world, cold wind bit my cheeks, & fluffy snow covered what once was brownish grass.

So much heart packed into 226 pages. ❤️💔❤️‍🔥💗 #SoryGraph #FictionalTraveler #2 #APlaceYouLove #CapeCod
#52BookClub2025 #13 #TitleinTenLettersorLess
#TBR #ReadYourBooks #11 #TBRfromShelf

This book made me catch my breath more than once whilst reading it. I felt like the author was tapped into my thoughts and feelings about life, aging, menopause, family etc Many passages sent me back into the delight and despair of motherhood with small and grownup children. The smell of small children, of the beach and ocean. Many passages resonated with me so strongly that I shared them with friends. Newman is now a must read author for me. ⬇️

It snowed here in the South so I‘m calling a personal snow day and staying in to read. Ozzie is pleased with my decision. And because it‘s freezing outside, I‘m reading about a week on Cape Cod in the summer.

Gosh, very different to my expectations and very insightful into menopause and mid life and families. I think it's well written and the plot, as such, is inclusive of necessary backstory.
Nicely done!

An amazing portrait of womanhood in middle age in a beautifully mundane and relatable life.

Finishing up this slim but powerful novel recommended by @CBee and I‘ve been pondering how to articulate my feelings about it. Just a few pages before the end I came to this poignant, eloquent passage that I felt sums up [one of] the book‘s themes. I appreciate how well Newman‘s writing captures the feelings of family life in middle age, so that even though the details of my marriage & family are quite different than Rocky‘s, I can relate.

2 things:

1) I love this book
2) My husband bought me a pillow for the bath that I was very skeptical about for Christmas and now can‘t live without. If you, like me, are a chronic bath reader, treat yourself. It‘s worth it.

Enjoying this short book about a woman ‘sandwiched‘ between her grown children & her parents. A great read with great characters, family secrets, & family dynamics.
I can‘t remember which Litten love this book and triggered me to read it, but thank you!
#BlameItOnLitsy

This book is funny at the start especially for those of us truly living the sandwich generation experience (and menopause)But this book wrecked me in the end. It‘s good but proceed with caution.

It was a fantastic reading year!

Favorites: Sandwich, In the Weeds, Ask Not, From Here to the Great Unknown, Migrations

The few stats I like to track:
library books — 119
nonfiction — 73
five star reads — 26

I have a “best of 2024” shelf on goodreads if you want to take a look. If we‘re not already connected, I‘m britt_brooke there, too. 🩷🩷

Maybe love is grief 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 👙⛱️🦞

⭐️⭐️/5
Decided to take a break from Christmas reads and thrillers…went with this one but it just wasn‘t for me, just OK🤷🏼‍♀️

Spent most of today reading this on the sunny deck (sun has gone now!) Felt like being on holiday myself. Newman writes in a conversational style that is easy to read and i felt a lot of similarities (age, an adult child). So this telling of a family vacation where she is sandwiched btw one generation and the next while going through menopause was a delight. It also delves into some serious stuff so potential for a few shed tears here too.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ A family visits their favorite Cape Cod cottage where they‘ve amassed so many memories. The kids are now grown, yet still young. Their interactions are relatable, sweet, brutally honest, and often funny. But there are secrets, too; accidental and intentional. The idea of preemptive grief hit home. Being a human is hard. Identifying with others is paramount. It‘s a quick read, but packed with a ton of heart. One of my best of 2024!

I really enjoyed this novel - a great setting of Cape Cod, well developed characters and the messiness of life. Rocky is menopausal and sandwiched between her adult children and aging parents. The story reminded me of others by Ann Patchett and Elizabeth Strout.

Just ok for me. I enjoyed the nostalgic aspects of having grown kids. But the menopause stuff was a bit much for me

A short and sweet #audiobook worth checking out.

⭐⭐⭐⭐

I laughed. I could relate. It was a quick read and one that made me only want to read read read! Love books that I can‘t put down, that suck me in, that have characters who are enraging and enraged, inconsistent and witty. This book is not about sandwiches the food - though a few are described. This is not all about the Cape Cod town of Sandwich Mass - though it provides the setting. This is about a menopausal woman navigating life between👇

Starting this one because it just came off a many week library hold; comes highly recommended.

Reuben Sandwiches are my favorite with balanced and generous proportions of melty Swiss, sauerkraut, and sauce. MUST be on marbled rye. You?

And, yes, I have stood on this pier of Sandwich MA though I doubt it was at sunset time. But this matches my other post for today. My favorite place on Cape Cod is Pocasset. No real reason other than 👇

Short and sweet and I loved it. If you are or were or could have been a mother this read is for you. Beach week with the family…this is a great quick read.

#daysdevotedto #sandwich

I read this and very much identified with a lot of the emotions!

@Eggs @Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks

Absolute true love for this book! I have laughed so hard I‘ve cried over and over while reading this and my heart has broken too many times. It‘s an absolute gem to read right now when women‘s reproductive rights are being taken away from them. Despite the laughter ( because if you can‘t laugh, you‘ll cry) there is a heavy message underlaying this story about what a woman bears in this life as a daughter, sister, wife, mother

#DaysDevotedTo #Sandwich #TBR

I started this last night, really late for me, at 10 pm. The day got away from me and I was so tired I only managed 2 chapters. I was laughing so hard I was crying and then I didn‘t want to go to sleep. It may be finished today. I love peanut M&M‘s although I didn‘t think of them as a kids candy, they are more a I need to survive this day strategy

I‘m at the stage in my life where I can relate to this book…aging parents, kids growing up, hormonal changes. I listened to it over audio & was a quick listen. For the most part I liked it, some parts irked me. I‘m adding a trigger warning since abortion is discussed a few times in the book.

I‘m trying so hard, but I‘m finding myself really pushing to stay with this one. Read because it‘s small and may be worth the ending or bail?

A 54 year old woman, Rocky, returns with her husband and adult children to the same vacation spot they have visited for over 25 years. While at the beach, Rocky wanders through a series of old memories, family traditions, ponderings of the past, and questions about the future. She tackles all aspects of womanhood—menopause, parenting, misogyny, childbirth, marriage, miscarriage, aging parents, sex. A lovely book with honesty, warmth, and humor.

Loved it. Quick read. Nothing much happens but I like that in a story.

Next up on kindle . . . I've seen this crop up with good reviews.

The best beach read is set at the beach. This book reminded me of the Dutch House with how warm the writing was to read. It‘s a great story about a family growing, bending but never breaking. It tells the story of a life well lived via a lot of flashbacks and memories - both good and bad.

This is NOT my usual - I am definitely more of a plot-driven reader, and this is really a character study. And while the MC is a bit much at times, she still felt real. I appreciate this look how my life might be in just a few years- children grown, menopause in full gear, aging parents. This was quite atmospheric too, with the setting being a week long family vacation at the beach. I could feel that.

Newman certainly writes protagonists who are a lot. At first Rocky seemed like she might be a bit too much for me but like everyone else in her life, I eventually fell under her spell. I had a good time spending a week on vacation with her and her out of the nest children, aging parents, and beleaguered husband. This book had moments where I was so annoyed I thought I would bail and moments that really touched me. Overall a light pick.

August favorite! But James beat it ♥️ Plus I had to add Clare Pooley‘s book as a bonus, it was just amazing and hilarious ♥️♥️ #readingbracket2024 @CSeydel