Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow book review

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin
Published by Vintage Digital on July 14, 2022
Pages: 383
Goodreads

This is not a romance, but it is about love

Two kids meet in a hospital gaming room in 1987. One is visiting her sister, the other is recovering from a car crash. The days and months are long there. Their love of video games becomes a shared world -- of joy, escape and fierce competition. But all too soon that time is over, fades from view.
When the pair spot each other eight years later in a crowded train station, they are catapulted back to that moment. The spark is immediate, and together they get to work on what they love - making games to delight, challenge and immerse players, finding an intimacy in digital worlds that eludes them in their real lives. Their collaborations make them superstars.
This is the story of the perfect worlds Sadie and Sam build, the imperfect world they live in, and of everything that comes after success: Money. Fame. Duplicity. Tragedy.
Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow takes us on a dazzling imaginative quest as it examines the nature of identity, creativity, disability, failure, the redemptive possibilities in play and, above all, our need to connect: to be loved and to love.

After seeing some really disparaging reviews of Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow I wasn’t sure whether I was going to hate it or love it. But this book took me by surprise, I ended up finishing with a sense of satisfaction and joy that I had been missing. It was such a great read, and it was even weirder that it didn’t end up being a fantasy read!

Plot of Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow

This book is the perfect snapshot of three lives and how they converge, evolve and how personalities adds certain dynamics. Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow follows, Sadie, Sam and Marx as they navigate the world of video games and what it actually means to produce and design. The best thing about having such a character driven plot was there was so much to digest and take a mouthful off and I adored it. When I actually think about the plot and what happened, the answer is not a lot, but when I say this book had me in a chokehold, I didn’t want to put it down.

By the end of the book I was so invested in this book and the various lives I was sad that it ended. I could have quite happily read another 1000 pages seeing how these different characters navigate life together and the disagreements they end up having. I think this is quickly becoming one of my favourite kind of books, where not a huge amount happens but the characters become the main attraction.

I don’t even think that the story needed anything in the end, it was perfectly finished off, and it definitely reflected the cycles of life. It was just perfect.

Characters in Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow

There is nothing bad that I can say about the characters. I loved learning about each and every one of them, I think there was such a great balance between likability and realism. No character apart from maybe Marx was perfect all the way through, they each had moments where I couldn’t stand them or where I was rooting for them 100%. Sam in particular was such a marmite character, there were moments I just wanted to scream at him to communicate, to lean on his friends and actually use their help. His interactions with Sadie were so raw and especially with Marx, the jealousy that rears it’s head as things start to go south for him. I didn’t realise it was possible to love and hate a character quite so violently all at the same time.

I’ve seen reviews of Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow that call Sadie, whingy and painful to read about which is completely true but I think the context is so important. These aren’t heroes and they aren’t out saving the world, they are normal people and what makes this book so brilliant is that Zevin doesn’t shy away from that. Sadie has moments where there is nothing I like about her and kinda wish she wasn’t part of the story, but without her there were no other redeeming parts for the other characters. She was a necessary evil the same as Sam was at certain points.

One character I won’t hear anything bad about was Marx, he was the most perfect human being of soppiness and I will die on a hill defending him. He was like the glue that all the rest of them needed and it was perfect. I just adored him!

Bad bits

• That it ended and wasn’t never-ending

Good bits

• Fantastic characters
• Realistic relationships and life events
• Brilliant references
• Well written

Who would like Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow?

I think if you enjoyed books like Yellowface and Lessons in Chemistry, this would be a good fit. All of these have strong characters and they each have some inherently unlikeable qualities which could you put them off the story as a whole.

Is this one on your TBR? If not it should be!