Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin Published by Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group on July 5, 2022
Genres: Fiction / Cultural Heritage, Fiction / Friendship, Fiction / Literary
Pages: 416
Format: Hardcover
Source: Book of the Month
NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER • Sam and Sadie—two college friends, often in love, but never lovers—become creative partners in a dazzling and intricately imagined world of video game design, where success brings them fame, joy, tragedy, duplicity, and, ultimately, a kind of immortality. It is a love story, but not one you have read before.
"Delightful and absorbing." —The New York Times • "Utterly brilliant." —John Green
One of the Best Books of the Year: The New York Times, Entertainment Weekly, TIME, GoodReads, Oprah Daily
From the best-selling author of The Storied Life of A. J. Fikry: On a bitter-cold day, in the December of his junior year at Harvard, Sam Masur exits a subway car and sees, amid the hordes of people waiting on the platform, Sadie Green. He calls her name. For a moment, she pretends she hasn’t heard him, but then, she turns, and a game begins: a legendary collaboration that will launch them to stardom.These friends, intimates since childhood, borrow money, beg favors, and, before even graduating college, they have created their first blockbuster, Ichigo. Overnight, the world is theirs. Not even twenty-five years old, Sam and Sadie are brilliant, successful, and rich, but these qualities won’t protect them from their own creative ambitions or the betrayals of their hearts.
Spanning thirty years, from Cambridge, Massachusetts, to Venice Beach, California, and lands in between and far beyond, Gabrielle Zevin’s Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow examines the multifarious nature of identity, disability, failure, the redemptive possibilities in play, and above all, our need to connect: to be loved and to love.
My Review
I picked this book up in January 2023 because it was the book club pick for laurenandthebooks patreon members for the month of January. The category that was voted on was for popular 2022 releases and this is the book that won the vote. I have to say upfront I am so glad that it did because I absolutely loved this story so much. It was also the first book I have ever read by this author and I am sure it will not be the last.
Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow is a multilayered book that spans over thirty years and follows the two main characters Sam and Sadie throughout their friendship. The novel follows all the highs and lows of growing up falling in love, falling out of love, fighting, finding oneself, friendships, and loss. This story is full of video games being played, talked about, designed, and created. In fact, video games are how Sadie and Sam met and became friends. Now with all that being said I should mention that I am in no way a gamer but that did not stop me from deeply enjoying this story. Not only did I enjoy it but I also learned some things about gaming and the work that goes into creating video games. I never knew it was such an artistic job or that it took so long to create something that people would enjoy.
The novel’s narration alternates between Sam and Sadie which is nice because you then get to see both sides of the story. Let me tell you sometimes it was frustrating and I just wanted to shake one or both of these characters for their stubbornness, misunderstanding, lack of communication, and arrogance. That is not to say that they did not have their good qualities as well because I did find their friendship to be a very realistic one with its up and downs, fun, laughter, and even love throughout the friendship. An example of the love present in their friendship happens early on in the story by both characters at different times.
There is not much I can or even want to say about the storyline because I do not want to give anything away. I feel it is best to go into this book with only the blurb description and let the story unfold as you read along. I will say though that the love that these two characters have for one another is like non-other. Both Sadie and Sam have their own struggles which differ greatly from one another. Sam has his disability and Sadie is faced with the reality of being a female game designer in a predominantly male field. I believe though that these obstacles really make the characters who they are along with some of their other experiences throughout childhood.
This book for me was everything I had hoped it would be and then some. I annotated it as I read because I just could not help myself. Some of the quotes I didn’t want to risk forgetting because they were either just so beautiful or relatable. One of my favorite quotes in this book can be found on page 311. It is a conversation happening between Sam and his grandmother Bong Cha. It reads like this:
There are no ghosts, but up here –she gestured to her head– “its a haunted house”.
This really struck me not only for the conversation between Sam and his Bong Cha but also for others who have faced traumas in their lifetime. I found that in little moments like the quote, I just mentioned there can be a lot of wisdom found or maybe that is just me because I tend to think and overthink things. So really the question is would I recommend this book and the answer is absolutely YES. With that being said though there are some trigger warnings that I must mention so please take care when picking this book up.
Trigger Warnings:
Parental Loss
Car Accidents
Childhood Cancer
Shootings
Murder
Amputation
Drug Use
Death from Cancer
Abusive Relationships
Infidelity
If you decide to pick this story up I do hope you are able to enjoy it as much as I did. Who knows maybe you will find yourself highlighting, tabbing, and marking the pages up as you go.