Description
NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER • WINNER OF THE GOODREADS CHOICE AWARD • 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.
elysejody –
I loved everything about this book…, It’s adorable, sweet, sad, theatrical, character-collaborative-driven-in-spirit, artful, smart, emotional, intellectually rigorous, perceptive, and wonderful…, I could name a dozen more vertiginously exciting . . . vibrant words, to reflect the deep satisfying experience this novel is., Even at oddball moments, Gabrielle Zevin’s novel flourishes surprising wisdom touching on the most common elements of the heart…..with unforgettable indelible characters., In totality…….IT’S ALL BRILLIANT!…..and VERY ENJOYABLE!!!, ….the writing, narrative, structure, (the gaming), the characters: (major and minor), and their relationships are LOVABLE as can be…., Sadie (Jewish-American) was one of the most brilliant people that Sam (American, part Korean and part Jewish descent) knew., He hadn’t seen her in years—until he did—since their childhood in Southern California. Sadie went to MIT, Sam went to Harvard…..[Sam’s roommate-Marx- is a crucial part of the story, too]…, Other favorite characters are *grandparents*… GOTTA LOVE the generations — of love…., The context themes of love, loss, and life tragedies, are captured with sincerity, depth, and honesty., This book could only have been written by somebody who has experienced grief to great lengths. Zevin has an impressive imagination and proficient talent…..leaving us readers with a memorable feat of storytelling, fine prose, and heartbreaking real characters., I was one of those readers who fell in love with her novel “The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry”…..(It wasn’t too ‘sappy’ for me as it was for a few of my friends), but THIS….”Tomorrow, Tomorrow, Tomorrow”…..is more sophisticated….more fully developed…., Zevin is in her prime with this novel…., ……I can’t imagine any reader ‘disliking’ it….., There is something for everyone….many issues to contemplate!!!!, …..an examination of very profound friendships—, The ‘relationship-complex-love-friendship-issues’ were masterfully explored., The brilliance shines throughout……, ….with a look at the effects of tragedies, violence, illness, death, parents, grandparents, feelings of loneliness, fitting in, admiration for gaming designers….(especially women in the profession)…love for people, love for one another, and an enhanced respect for the benefits of gaming ……, About the aspects of ‘gaming’ …., …..NOBODY NEEDS TO BE DIRECTLY interested…., But……I realized by the end of this novel (after tearful melancholy feelings), that there are benefits from gaming…., They ‘really’ must improved cognitive abilities, improved problem-solving skills and logic…., BECAUSE…., …..the characters in this novel (who played and created these games) WERE able to apply their technical skills to their relationships. It was subtle—but not-not unnoticed., So…..parents: I wouldn’t worry if you can’t get your kid to stop playing games too much. It’s amazing how much they are learning about life….in relationship to others., One more thing I must say …..then I’ll leave a few excerpts…, I thought the very beginning was MASTERFULLY written. I can’t remember ever reading a book that pointed to the ‘past, present, and the future’ at the same time more magnificently. SO WELL DONE!!!, Ok….enough of my excitement…., Here are some excerpts:, “Before Mazer invented himself as Mazer, he was Samson Mazer, and before he was Samson Mazer, he was Samson Mazur—a change of two letters that transformed him from a nice ostensibly jewish boy to a Professional Builder of Worlds— and for most of his youth he was Sam—S.A.M. on the hall of fame of his grandfather’s ‘Donkey Kong’ machine, but mainly Sam”., NOTE: the above excerpt— written at the start- is worth reading a few times. (IMO)….then let it go…..it will show up in different ways through the rest of the novel., “Sadie! SADIE! He felt foolish. SADIE MIRANDA GREEN! YOU HAVE DIED OF DYSENTERY!”, “Finally, she turned. She scanned the crowd slowly and when she spotted Sam, the smile spread over her face like a time-lapse video he had once seen in a high school physics class of a rose in bloom. It was beautiful, Sam thought, and perhaps, he worried, a tad ersatz. She walked over to him, still smiling—one dimple on her right cheek, an almost imperceptibly wider gap between the two middle teeth on top—and he thought that the crowd seemed to part for her, in a way that the world never moved for him”., “It’s my sister who died of dysentery, Sam Masur, Sadie said. I died of exhaustion, following a snakebite”., “And of not wanting to shoot the bison, Sam said”., “It’s wasteful. All that meat just rots”., “Sadie through her arms around him. Sam Masur! I kept hoping I’d run into you”., “What brings you to Harvard Square? Sam asked”., “Why the Magic Eye, of course, she said playfully. She gestured in front of her, toward the advertisement. For the first time, Sam registered the 60-by-40-inch poster that transformed commuters into zombie horde”., “SEE THE WORLD IN A WHOLE NEW WAY. THIS CHRISTMAS, THE GIFT EVERYONE WANTS IS THE MAGIC EYE”., Sadie….with those, heterochromic eyes….., “In which case, the only proper thing for us to do right now is have coffee, Sam said. Or whatever you drink, if coffee’s too much of a cliché for you. Chai tea. Matcha. Snapple. Champagne. There’s a world with infinite beverage possibilities, right over our heads, you know? All we have to do is ride that escalator and it’s hours for the partaking”., “If this were a game, he could hit pause. He could restart, say different things, the right one’s this time. He could search his inventory for the item that would make Sadie not leave”., “You would think women would want to stick together when there weren’t many of them, but they never did. It was as if being a woman was a disease that you didn’t wish to catch. As long as you didn’t associate with the other women, you could imply to the majority, the men: ‘I’m not like those other ones’. Sadie was, by nature, a loner, but even she found going to MIT in a female body to be an isolating experience. The year Sadie was admitted to MIT, women were slightly over a third of her class, but somehow, it felt like even less than that. Sadie sometimes felt as if she could go weeks without seeing a woman. It might have been that the men, most of them at least, assumed you were stupid if you were a woman”., “What is a game? … It’s tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow. It’s a possibility of infinite rebirth, infinite redemption. The idea that if you keep playing, you could win. No loss is permanent, because nothing is permanent, ever”., Wonderful….as wonderful as can be!!!, elysejody
Bridget Sheppard –
I had no idea what to expect when I started Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow. I had heard what an amazing book it was, that it was the book of the year for several outlets, and that it was a story about two friends making a video game together., But wow, was this book incredible! It touches on so many things, including the ups and downs of a multi-decade friendship, love, death and trauma, LGBTQ+ rights, women’s equality in the video game industry, mental health, race, and disability., I really don’t want this to be a spoiler, so I don’t want to give away too many plot details, but here is a brief synopsis: Sadie and Sam meet when they are around 12. Sam is in the hospital after a car accident. After their friendship is tested for the first time, they don’t talk for years, but they meet up again in college. It’s then that they decide to build their first video game together, along with their producer and friend, Marx. They create a game company and continue making more games over the years as their company grows and they become leaders in the video game industry. During this time, their friendship continues to be tested in so many ways as new colleagues come into their lives and love interests develop. A huge tragedy strikes, driving them apart for years. But in the end, their friendship comes full circle and begins healing once again., I LOVED the character development in this book. Sam, Sadie, Marx, and their colleagues and loves all felt so real—all with their own strengths and weaknesses., There are a couple very unique parts of this book. In one, Sam and Sadie are playing a video game Sam built, and the story is written from the perspective of their characters. Another breathtaking part has to do with a character in a coma and how they are processing the world around them., You don’t have to be a gamer to enjoy this book, because the true heart of this story revolves around the characters lives and relationships with each other. If you’re looking for a unique, beautiful, sometimes heartbreaking story, I highly recommend this book!
Booklover –
I almost loved this. I loved the first third and had high hopes for the rest of the story as I really loved the first book I read of hers, The Storied Life of AJ Fikry. That was a tighter story. This one feels too long and could have benefited from cutting and tightening. There were some choppy flashbacks that I ended up skimming to get back to the main storyline. There was also a whole section near the end that I found frustrating as it was gameplay and it wasn’t initially clear what was going on. I skimmed that too. The ending fell a bit flat for me–although it was also probably more realistic than the ending I would have liked. Overall, I recommend the book, and I look forward more from her.
Muse –
I have mixed feelings on this book but I’ll settle on 4 stars rounded up from like a 3.75. It was captivating, so well written and beautiful it’s own way. It was also incredibly frustrating. Sam and Sadie are as Sam and Sadie but both of them weren’t my favorite characters. There were times I despised them both. Part of me probably recognizes that as my own painful recognition of being human, part of me just wishes they could have communicated better. Alas. Life is sometimes painful, expressing yourself is sometimes hard., I will say somewhere in the middle it just felt LONG. it felt a bit like wading through incessant drama and petty arguments that again, frustrated me. Sometimes the sudden switch of timelines was a bit too abrupt and it took me a while to catch up., In the end idk. It was a good, introspective read, but probably not something I’d turn to again and again. Maybe I’ll feel different in a few weeks.