Not a lot of people know this about me but I love playing video games! I probably play every day even if it's a just one level of Candy Crush! I can't explain it because in many ways it seems out of character but as long as they've been around I've played them. There, now I've said it and it's out there and my intellectual credibility is probably compromised! 😱
I'd seen Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow splayed across social media and wondered if it was another of those books that was all over the place one minute and gone the next. I had a vague idea it was about gamers and gaming but that was all. But I found a copy in my local library and settled down to read. Wow!
The sense of nostalgia was immense. I recognised the names of the older games (I still retain such affection for Mario) and I found the references to The Oregon Trail so funny because......... it's a game I'm currently playing! How weird is that? But as I read my way through the levels of the book it became so much more than a book about gaming. It's deceptively multi layered and erudite with references to Shakespeare, Homer and Emily Dickinson for starters. Life as a game is a much used, and some might say abused metaphor, but when it's used in the right hands it works. It does here. So it broadens the novel beyond a story about gamers and gaming.
Sam and Sadie's friendship begins in more unusual circumstances than many friendships and it's an association that endures throughout the book and throughout their lives. It's not always harmonious and there were times when I could have slapped the pair of them but it's real. It's not really romance but it is love. Thus it becomes very moving.
The book implicitly acknowledges the reason so many of us play games - to escape the real world for a place of infinite possibilities. Where you can have infinite lives and start over when everything goes tits up. But here Sam and Sadie create games commercially. Best selling games at that. That part of the book I felt like I'd read before in similar stories but it didn't jar for long because there's so much more. They also create games to help them understand their lives and their relationships with others.Some things were unexpected and I didn't expect to be heartbroken which I was at one point in the story.
My favourite character was Marx because he's the kind of person I would love to have in my life, the kind of friend I'd love to have. Sam and Sadie are flawed but real but I was rooting for them even though I got annoyed with them sometimes.
I think the book also gave a palpable depiction of two different US coasts. I am British but I have travelled to both sides of the US in particular Boston and New York so I did enjoy that aspect of the book too. I haven't been to California but just above it if that counts!
Yep, it was an enjoyable read. Now if you'll excuse me I need to get back to the Oregon Trail - before anyone dies of dysentery
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