Book Club Discussion: Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow

[ufcasey]

For the month of August, the book club pick was Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin

Below are some optional book questions. Feel free to answer some/none/all or just give your general impressions of the book if you would like to do that instead.

Optional questions:

1. What video games have you formed an attachment to in your life, as a child and/or as an adult?
2. Both Sadie and Sam use games to explicitly memorialize their loved ones and process their losses. If you could design a game to change or preserve some part of your reality, what would it be like?
3. Do you think Sadie and Sam regret the choices they made for Mapleworld, given how the game’s political voice led to Marx’s death? Do you think Marx had any regrets?
4. The novel bends its narrative form to assume the structure of the games in various places—namely, Both Sides,the NPC, and Pioneers How did your reading experience shift in those sections? Did the format enhance your immersion into the worlds the team was building, even through text alone?
5. How does Dov set the standards for Sadie’s work as a game designer, as a woman, and as a wife/partner to both Sam and Marx? What compels her to keep him in her life even after they break up?

[ufcasey]

Tagging people who may have read this book:
mrspez07, isabel, wildrice, nancybotwin, sju, krystee, Vespasia, al dente, toepick, eb777888, shopgirl07, scm1011, tacokick, Jalapeñomel, StrawberryBlondie, neverfstop, msmerymac, rupertpenny, wawa, sugarbear1, bears, TR, underwaterrhymes, Gato, just, chedifuen

[travella]

I was pleasantly surprised by this book. I wasn't expecting to like it, in fact I was expecting to DNF it. The summary didn't really interest me, but I saw so many people talking about it that I thought I would give it a try.

I didn't care for Sadie or Sam. However, I liked Marx so when he left the storyline I kind of lost interest in the book. I also found it very difficult getting through the gaming world chapters. It just didn't work for me until the very end when I discovered why she seemed to have thrown that in there for no reason. I liked how she pulled everything together in the end. In the end I gave it 3*.

What video games have you formed an attachment to in your life, as a child and/or as an adult?
From my childhood The Oregon Trail, Frogger, and Mario. I am not a gamer so there are no games I'm attached to as an adult, but I did recognize some of the games mentioned from my husband and kids playing.

[estrellita]

I read this early this year and really loved it. I enjoyed reading about the games they created and the friendship between the main characters. I can't remember specific details off the top of my head but it also felt unique in that parts of the story seemed to be similar to other books I've read, but overall I haven't read a book like it before.

There are several games that bring back memories from my childhood, and ones I've loved playing over the years. Oregon Trail, and others I can't remember by name. One that comes to mind is one where you're a fish and I can't for the life of me remember the name 😂 N64 was my prime as a kid. Mario Kart, Mario Party, 007, lots of games played with friends or by myself. I did play World of Warcraft for years. Off and on from senior year of high school to when I was pregnant with my son, so almost 10 years! I occasionally miss it, but there's no way I have the time for it!

[tacokick]

I did read it but I did not enjoy it! I read it very early either as an ARC or like the day it came out and I was surprised it became such a hit.

1. I have played the Sims off and on since it came out! Also Animal Crossing.

2. This would not be appealing to me

3. I’m not sure if they did have any regrets.

4. I thought this was a real weak point for the book. It dragged on for way too long and was tedious to read. I kept hoping it would end.

5. I found Sadie to be grating and as I recall, disappointing. I was kind of surprised the author was a woman.

[wawa]

I read it! I...can't say I enjoyed it. It was engaging while I was reading it, and felt well written, but I never understood the emotional or relationship decisions anybody made. I don't know why Marx put up with them, let alone loved them. Just... frustrating people which makes it hard for me. I don't have to like characters but when they annoy me it's hard to relax into a book. They felt like.... Fitzgerald characters almost. Spoiled, self-indulgently tragic. Interesting at first but not the kind of people I find it easy to care about.

I'm not a big gamer - but it was a big way I bonded with my big brother when he'd let me play early DOS games on his computer. Castle of the winds was the main one. I killed so many kobolds.

[dearprudence]

Sept 1, 2023 14:03:51 GMT -5 travella said:

I didn't care for Sadie or Sam. However, I liked Marx so when he left the storyline I kind of lost interest in the book. I also found it very difficult getting through the gaming world chapters.

This sums it up for me.

I love the television show Mythic Quest, which has a very very very similar premise, but no one is trying to "ship" Ian and Poppy. And though they're also not likeable, the charm of the show lies in the ensemble which is missing here.

I also didn't even notice a format or narrative text shift, so that part wasn't especially effective in terms of my reading/understanding.

[msmerymac]

Hopefully I'll be back in a few weeks - I just got it off of hold!

[al dente]

Sept 2, 2023 20:42:45 GMT -5 tacokick said:

5. I found Sadie to be grating and as I recall, disappointing. I was kind of surprised the author was a woman.

I read this awhile ago so don't remember specifics, but everything Tacokick said especially this. It was my far my biggest take away. I was so annoyed that the author set up this kick ass women in a male dominated field, and then the character proceeded to be basically every bad female stereotype. Honestly I get a little mad whenever I think about it and hear how much people loved the book lol. This thread is the first time I haven't seen a list of rave reviews.

[ufcasey]

I really liked this book though I thought the parts where the story narrative took place inside the video game as they dealt with their grief was weird and I did not enjoy that. I understood where the author was going with it, because a lot of people play games as escapism from their own lives, but still. Agreed that Marx was the best character out of all of them and Sadie's character wasn't doing any favors to women wanting to enter the male dominated industry of game creation.

[rootbeerfloat]

I liked the premise and nostalgia of the book, but Sam and Sadie were exhausting, and I was annoyed that they killed Marx.

[rupertpenny]

Add me to the list of people who didn't like this book. It was very engaging most of the time, but Sam and Sadie drove me crazy. I didn't think about it this way, but it is surprising that Sadie was written by a woman. Her whole relationship with the professor was exhausting.

Also, this is a minor quibble but I think Marx has to be the least appropriately named character in the history of fiction. His father was a Japanese industrialist and his mother was a Korean American woman who was alive and sentient during the Korean War. Neither of those people would ever name a kid Marx or anything communism adjacent! Sure, maybe he was named after Groucho Marx, but I doubt it.

[expectantsteelerfan]

I didn't like the book either. I was hooked at the beginning, but the lack of growth of Sam and Sadie had me not caring by the end of the book. Seeing how stuck they were in the toxic patterns of their friendship that seemed solidified from when they were kids and didn't know better was sad and exhausting and unnecessary. Sam grew through his relationship with Marx, even after Marx was gone, so I was more disappointed with Sadie, but by the end I didn't care at all about if she and Sam reconciled or made more games or anything.
And if I remember correctly, no one in my IRL book club really loved this book either. None of us are big gamers though.

[msmerymac]

I liked it. I liked the author's previous book, the Storied Life of AJ Fikry, better, but this one was definitely more ambitious with more layers. Also not exactly autobiographical, but the author did grow up in Koreatown (and as a previous resident of Los Angeles, I could tell she was very familiar with the city) and went to Harvard.

I like alternate narratives so I actually really enjoyed the Pioneers chapter. I figured it was a game pretty early, but trying to figure out exactly what was going on interested me.

Early on, I figured both Sam and Sadie were pretty flawed. Once Sadie decided that Sam had seen the disc that was signed by Dov and had this big plan to use her to get Dov's engine regardless of the consequences... well, I think it was overblown (especially since it affected their relationship for so long) and that Sadie didn't take responsibility for her own choices while being so sure of Sam's motives. On the flip side, I tried to keep an open mind that perhaps Sam's love for Sadie and motives weren't as pure as they had been made out to be in the Magic Eye chapter. I don't particularly want to read the book again, but I'd be interested to see how my impressions of the characters change in the early chapters if I did.

Sadie was definitely right that they probably couldn't have become successful game designers at any other time - they main characters are around the same age as my husband and he knows a few people who made it big in tech before the first dot com bubble, for example, which was a crazy time. Although I was confused as to how she could still co-own a company and really not do any work for like 5 years.

[wawa]

Oct 5, 2023 9:30:48 GMT -5 msmerymac said:

I liked it. I liked the author's previous book, the Storied Life of AJ Fikry, better, but this one was definitely more ambitious with more layers. Also not exactly autobiographical, but the author did grow up in Koreatown (and as a previous resident of Los Angeles, I could tell she was very familiar with the city) and went to Harvard.

I like alternate narratives so I actually really enjoyed the Pioneers chapter. I figured it was a game pretty early, but trying to figure out exactly what was going on interested me.

Early on, I figured both Sam and Sadie were pretty flawed. Once Sadie decided that Sam had seen the disc that was signed by Dov and had this big plan to use her to get Dov's engine regardless of the consequences... well, I think it was overblown (especially since it affected their relationship for so long) and that Sadie didn't take responsibility for her own choices while being so sure of Sam's motives. On the flip side, I tried to keep an open mind that perhaps Sam's love for Sadie and motives weren't as pure as they had been made out to be in the Magic Eye chapter. I don't particularly want to read the book again, but I'd be interested to see how my impressions of the characters change in the early chapters if I did.

Sadie was definitely right that they probably couldn't have become successful game designers at any other time - they main characters are around the same age as my husband and he knows a few people who made it big in tech before the first dot com bubble, for example, which was a crazy time. Although I was confused as to how she could still co-own a company and really not do any work for like 5 years.

that part didn't feel weird to me at all.  Owners don't have to be involved in the day to day of a company as long as they've hired somebody else to make decisions.