Tomorrow, Tomorrow, Tomorrow

Thoughts on Tomorrow, Tomorrow, Tomorrow…

Opinions on art and reflections of life events are as much as statement on the state of mind at that specific time of the person doing the opining as much as anything else.  So with that said I’ll note that my review of this book was greatly influenced by the sense of nostalgia that came from living and working in Boston and Cambridge at about the same time as the two main characters.  Along with several other character references that directly mimic my life - some only told after a few shots.  

The Book, like Mapletown, one of the video games the main characters build, has two distinct parts. The first half is a feel good story of the ideal all American white affluent girl, Sadie Green, who kindly develops a friendship with a first generation immigrant Asian with crooked teeth boy with a disability, Sam Masur, in a hospital in LA.  One is reminded of the Fault in our Stars and tugs at those same heart strings.  This childhood relationship ends after an overly sensitive mis-understanding and after a five year gap, their story continues across the Continent in Boston where the two main characters reconnect.  The output of their connection is the producing of several hit video games and UnFair Games, a video game Company.  

Along the way we are introduced to others whose substantial contributions can be wrongly characterized as a NPCs (non player characters).  An NPC in video games is not controlled by a human and is served mostly as chum for the game to devour.  The first of these is Dov.  Dov is Sadie’s MIT teacher and also successful video game producer who seduces Sadie.  It becomes a toxic romantic relationship as evidenced by the BDSM and bruises however it is suggested that Sadie has to endure this for the benefit of the Company and the games they produce.  

The second “NPC” is Marx who the third founding member of UnFair Games, Sam’s ever helpful roommate, and along the way he becomes Sadies love interest following the romantic exorcism of Dov.  Marx is the character that is perfect.  He is loved by everyone, never has a bad breakup with anyone and is always doing the right thing.  The first part of the Book with the ups and downs culminates with the getting together of Marx and Sadie who are expecting a child and the happiness that should bring. 

However, this is a book about Sam and Sadie and so we have a dark twist in the Book which also symbolically reflects the schism of MapleWorld.  One part of MapleWorld is light and kind and idyllic and appeals to the masses.  The other part is Myre Landing which is dark, medieval, plague infested and for the more artistic game aficionados.  So Marx the NPC must be destroyed to make way for the two main characters.  The circumstance of his death was rather hackneyed and inspired by the cultural victim de jour and I did not care for that.  The premise was that two white red neck hicks were annoyed that MapleWorld (which was the online sequel to MapleTown) allowed gay weddings and thus these two were out to scare Sam for that affront.  Sam was not in the office and Marx plays the hero who literally jumps in front the bullets meant for another co-worker who does happen to be gay unbeknownst to the attackers.  This is so far fetched in real life however so prevalent in the minds of the cultural elite that it becomes overly played out in so many contemporary books and movies.  

A more accurate storyline which is actually referenced in the book would be that Marx is walking back from a store to the office in Venice Beach and is accosted by a homeless drug addict and ends up in a violent end.  I’ll leave skin color out of it, however an equally realistic encounter would be had with that as a backdrop.  It would take courage to use real data and create a storyline around that these days.  Towards the end of the book when Sam and Sadie are the elders they lament the addiction to trauma and victimhood in the succeeding generation.  However the author is as much guilty of that as that which she is lamenting.  One imagines she played up the homophobia and gender ambiguity to appeal to Netflix when they secure the rights to the adaptation of the book into a 8 part Limited Series.

The book has a rather long denouement which never quite gets to the final pairing of Sam and Sadie.  However, it doesn’t take much imagination for the reader to know that if there was to be a sequel, The Day after Tomorrow, Tomorrow, Tomorrow… Sam and Sadie getting together would be as real as Ichigo 3.  

Finally, I too liked Hektor…. 

12/5/2024