SANDWICH
BY CATHERINE NEWMAN
Nora Ephron’s salad dressing in Heartburn, jollof rice in Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Americanah, hot buttered toast by the fire in The Hundred And One Dalmatians… Food in fiction instantly transports us (and our senses) into other delicious worlds but it is also often about showing love – to ourselves and others.
This is what powers Catherine Newman’s books: her funny-and-moving 2022 debut We All Want Impossible Things and now Sandwich are full of delicious descriptions of green beans covered in butter, salt and lemon zest; lobster and chilled white wine; and dark chocolate ice-cream. Her heroine, Rocky, is constantly thinking about food as she holidays on Cape Cod over the course of a week with her husband, two twenty-something children, her son’s girlfriend, a cat and her elderly parents.
Rocky is also simultaneously grieving past choices and the loss of her children to adulthood because – as Newman is brilliant at capturing – life is complex, so eat something delicious and treasure being with those you love. A holiday reading gem for summer.
Sandwich by Catherine Newman is out now (£16.99, Doubleday)
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BEHIND YOU IS THE SEA
BY SUSAN MUADDI DARRAJ
Set against a bustling backdrop of Baltimore’s Palestinian-American community, this is a funny and beautifully written book of interconnected stories about three families. Despite how money, class and striving for the American dream may define people from the outside, we’re all connected by the same things: family, hope and love.
Out now, (£14.99, Swift Press)
THE MIDNIGHT FEAST
BY LUCY FOLEY
Is there anything more enjoyable than a new Lucy Foley mystery? Her irresistible Agatha Christie-inspired mysteries (see The Guest List and The Hunting Party) mean one isolated location, awful guests, hidden vendettas and red herrings galore. Set in a luxury retreat in D
