“A nurse noticing the unattended, conspicuously healthy eleven-year-old in the waiting room, suggested that Sadie might like to use the game room. There was a Nintendo console, he promised, which was rarely used on weekday afternoons. But the game room was not empty. A boy was playing Super Mario Bros. Sadie determined that he was a sick kid. He was wearing pajamas in the middle of the day, a pair of crutches rested on the floor beside his chair, and he left foot was surrounded by a medieval-looking cage-like contraption.”
I’m Betty Martin with "Martin’s Must Reads" and those are some lines from the first chapter of Gabrielle Zevin’s newest novel Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow. Sadie and Sam meet in the hospital when they are ten. Sadie is visiting her sister who is having cancer treatments. Sam is recuperating from one of many surgeries to repair his foot that was broken in a car accident that killed his mother.
Sadie plays with Sam for over 600 hours before they have a misunderstanding. They lose touch for ten years until they reconnect in a Boston subway. Both are programming geniuses and create their first blockbuster video game before even finishing college.
Sam’s roommate Marx is his only other best friend who watches out for him and becomes the office manager for their successful gaming company. There are insights into what it takes to make a hit video game, but the story is really more about relationships, Sam and Sadie’s in particular. Here’s what the book jacket says, "It’s a novel that “examines the multifarious nature of identity, disability, failure, the redemptive possibilities in play, and, above all, our need to connect.”
If you’re looking for novel about relationships that revolve around the gaming world, then you must read Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin.
