Read. Write. Listen. Create.

This is by far one of my favorite books that I’ve read for book club. I gave it a four out of five stars. I’m not a gamer by any means – I think the video game I played the most while growing up was Diddy Kong Racing at my friend’s house – but not being immersed in any kind of gaming world didn’t stop me from liking this book.

Taking place throughout the mid to late 1990s and early 2000s, Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow is about Sadie and Sam who meet around eleven years old and bond over video games while they’re both at the hospital. Sadie’s sister has cancer and Sam has been in a bad accident and has severely injured his foot. The story skips around a bit, showing how Sadie and Sam have stayed friends throughout the years. The flashbacks help add to the story and help give a layer of depth to the storyline. While still in college, Sadie and Sam create a video game that becomes a best seller. Their relationship is never romantic, however it shows the deep love of friendship and bonding over a certain thing even when life moves on and people change. They sometimes go years without talking and their fights can be brutal, but something always brings them back together.

This book tackles a lot of painful events in someone’s life; death, cancer, disability, gun violence, depression, as well as racial and gender inequality. It also dives into cultural appropriation since Sam is half Korean and Caucasian while Sadie is Jewish, the first game they create is about a young Japanese child called Ichigo. They create a few more games together, but slowly drift apart as Sam’s foot becomes worse and Sadie starts to date their game producer, Sam’s friend and old roommate, Marx. They are there for each other in profound phases of each other’s lives, but aren’t as close as they once were.

The book does feel long, but I found myself wanting to keep reading. It is written very well and I liked having flashbacks from different character’s point of view. They’ll always have gaming to bond over and I think that’s what makes Sadie and Sam’s relationship feel real. We all have friends that we haven’t talked to in forever, but there was a time when we had something that made our friendship strong.

What I love about the title of the book is that it comes from a line in Shakespeare, but it’s also what happens in a video game even when your player has died, they can start fresh the next time you play. That’s what Sam loves about video games; they’re an escape from his world of disability. He’ll always have infinite tomorrows when he plays.