Wreck

Author: Newman, Catherine

Modern & contemporary fiction (post c 1945)

Published on 29 January 2026 by Transworld Publishers Ltd (Doubleday) in the United Kingdom.

Hardback | 256 pages
223 x 146 x 29 | 364g

THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER ABOUT WHAT IT IS TO BE BEAUTIFULLY, MESSILY HUMAN 'The kind of book that pulls up a chair, pours the wine, and dives deep... like spending hours with the friend who sees your mess and loves you more for it.' ALISON ESPACH, author of The Wedding People'I LOVE her work... the antidote to these times' MARIAN KEYES'Darkly funny, achingly emotional' Woman & Home'Infectiously funny' RACHEL JOYCE, author of The Homemade GodRocky, Nick, Willa and Jamie. A normal loving, anxious, messy, 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 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. On the surface, she is still living her best life as the irreverent, funny beating heart of her family. Her father is his unique, adorable self; Willa is prone to bouts of existential angst whilst berating the fact that her mother has zero filter; Nick is steady, logical, sometimes infuriating.

But if accidents can happen – and they do – is it 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.

'Hugely enjoyable, absolutely real and thoughtful...Newman has an Ephon-esque gift for blending the sharp and the sad and an ability to let us love her creations.’ Observer‘The new queen of the bittersweet novel’ Independent‘Insightful and totally relatable’ Good Housekeeping‘I’m in awe of Newman’s talent for finding humour in life’s disasters and indignities. Seriously funny’ SagaReaders say:'Wreck feels like Newman was writing directly to me. And what's so impressive is, I think many, many, many readers will feel like it was just for them too.''I laughed so hard...I cried, I felt it all so deeply, and it felt so deeply''Feels like meeting up with old friends''I feel seen every time I read [Catherine Newman's] words''There is just some kind of magic in Catherine Newman’s writing that makes me want to dog-ear every page'