Sandwich by Catherine Newman perfectly captures the place in life where I am RIGHT NOW. It’s about Rocky, a middle-aged mom of two grown kids, who is on her annual weeklong beach vacation at a rental house in Cape Cod. Her older son is there with his girlfriend, her parents arrive for their usual two-night stay, and they do all the things they always do when they go to the beach. That’s all that happens. But it’s really a book about motherhood, family, the passage of time and how to let things – and people – go. Rocky grieves for her empty nest, for the fact that her parents won’t be around forever, and even for the miscarriage she had after her children were born. There were times when I was annoyed by her self-centeredness, how her thoughts always revolved around how she was affected by others’ actions and how unique she felt in the fierceness of her feelings and her stage of life. But then I thought, wait, this is pretty much how we all feel, even if we don’t express it, right? Yes, her children were too kind and supportive, and yes, her husband was too patient to be credible, and yes, nothing really happens in the book. But Sandwich is an eloquently written, poignant and honest account of a very particular slice of midlife, and I totally got it.