> Skip to content
  • Published: 28 October 2025
  • ISBN: 9781529959703
  • Imprint: Doubleday
  • Format: Trade Paperback
  • Pages: 240
  • RRP: $38.00

Wreck

  • Catherine Newman




From the NYT bestselling author of WE ALL WANT IMPOSSIBLE THINGS and SANDWICH. One family, one year and a novel that remind us what it means to be beautifully, messily human.

From the NYT bestselling author of WE ALL WANT IMPOSSIBLE THINGS and SANDWICH.

'The kind of book that pulls up a chair, pours the wine, and dives deep—equal parts hilarious, sharp, and achingly sincere. It’s like spending hours with the friend who sees your mess and loves you more for it. I didn’t just read it—I felt known by it.' Alison Espach, New York Times bestselling author of The Wedding People

'A delight... Newman's prose is laugh-out-loud funny. It's also profound. I didn't want it to end.' J. Courtney Sullivan, New York Times bestselling author of The Cliffs

_______

Rocky, Nick, Willa and Jamie. A normal loving, anxious, messy, unpredictable, relatable, family.

Rocky has her own her way of processing disasters: 1. This could happen to us. 2. This couldn’t happen to us. And then there’s a secret third column: ‘This could happen to us unless I am very careful/ superstitious/ grateful…’

So what happens when ‘this could happen to us’ turns into ‘it really might be me’?

When a former classmate of Jamie’s dies in a seemingly random accident, Rocky becomes obsessed. She's also developed a niggling medical condition that won't go away. Even so, she is still living her best life as the irreverent, funny, unpredictably beating heart of her family. Her father is his unique, outspoken adorable self; her daughter Willa is prone to bouts of existential angst whilst berating the fact that her mother has zero filter; husband Nick is steady, logical, and sometimes infuriating.

But if accidents can happen – and they do – is it really safe to love anyone?

Laugh out loud funny and deeply emotional, WRECK follows Rocky and her family through one rollercoaster year as they share the unpredictable, beautiful messiness of life.

_______

PRAISE FOR SANDWICH & WE ALL WANT IMPOSSIBLE THINGS:

'Breezy New York Nora-Ephron-style wit meets hospice memoir to create something profoundly beautiful...comforting, so funny, moving but never mawkish and packed with all kinds of love. It's one of my favourite books ever' bestselling author, MARIAN KEYES

'One of the funniest books I've ever read' FEARNE COTTON, STYLIST

'I adored this book. Jubilant, devastating, tender, heartbreaking, I found myself both in tears and 'snorty-laughing'. A masterclass on friendship, family love, memory, and the messiness of life and love and dying. Pure genius' RACHEL JOYCE, author of the bestseller The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry

'Tragically funny, with moments of clarity and wisdom, Newman writes loss and laughter in equally brilliant amounts' BONNIE GARMUS, bestselling author of Lessons in Chemistry

'Newman is truly a master of taking complex and chaotic human emotion and making sense of it ... wise and exquisitely written' GUARDIAN

'Sandwich is joy in book form. I laughed continuously, except for the parts that made me cry. Catherine Newman does a miraculous job reminding us of all the wonder there is to be found in life.' ANN PATCHETT, New York Times bestselling author of Tom Lake

  • Published: 28 October 2025
  • ISBN: 9781529959703
  • Imprint: Doubleday
  • Format: Trade Paperback
  • Pages: 240
  • RRP: $38.00

Praise for Wreck

Wreck is the kind of book that pulls up a chair, pours the wine, and dives deep—equal parts hilarious, sharp, and achingly sincere. It’s like spending hours with the friend who sees your mess and loves you more for it. I didn’t just read it—I felt known by it. A luminous, laugh-out-loud triumph by Newman.

Alison Espach, New York Times bestselling author of The Wedding People

Endorsing a new Catherine Newman novel feels a bit like endorsing puppies or chocolate cake. It's a new Catherine Newman novel. Of course you want to read it. Wreck is a delight. What an absolute joy to be reunited with Rocky and her family, the characters we all fell in love with in Sandwich. Newman's prose is laugh-out-loud funny. It's also profound. I underlined so many passages in this treasure of a novel. It brought about that conundrum that the best books always do: I couldn't stop reading, even though I didn't want it to end.

J. Courtney Sullivan, New York Times bestselling author of The Cliffs