Reviews with content warning for Racism - Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow

Reviews tagging 'Racism'

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin

367 reviews

yvo_about_books's review against another edition

emotional reflective slow-paced

2.0

Finished reading: January 28th 2024

“This is what time travel is. It’s looking at a person, and seeing them in the present and the past, concurrently. And that mode of transport only worked with those one had known a significant time.”

WARNING: it's unpopular opinion time again!!

Right. I confess that I was already a bit hesitant to pick up Tomorrow, And Tomorrow, And Tomorrow, because hyped books and me don't usually tend to get along... But since I consider one of her other books an all time favorite, I ended up giving in when I saw I needed a book about gaming for one of the challenges this year. Sadly, I didn't get along AT ALL with this book. I'm starting to believe The Storied Life Of A.J. Fikry was the outlier, and her writing just isn't the right fit for me... Because to say that I struggled with Tomorrow, And Tomorrow, And Tomorrow is an understatement. Initially I was cautiously hopeful even though the pace was a lot slower than expected, but things soon started to go downhill. There is something almost pretentious about the writing, 'woke' characters/topics and the plot, and it kind of left me with a bad taste in my mouth. I can't say that I was a fan of Sam and Sadie's friendship at all, and they never felt like 'real' characters to me. It was almost like they were shouting: 'Look how different I am! Look how special I am! Look how I'm better than you!'... And it was a huge turn off for me. Add Sadie's relationship with Dov (cringeworthy and only made me like her character even less), and other topics introduced seemingly just to show how 'woke' the author is, and I confess that I started to skimread long before the halfway mark. In fact, I should have just DNFed it instead... Tomorrow, And Tomorrow, And Tomorrow most definitely wasn't the book for me, and I think I'll just leave her books alone in the future. Sure, A.J. Fikry did receive a 5 star rating, but this has been the third time her other titles have failed to hit the mark for me... And sometimes you just have to know when to throw in the towel.

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jillaay_h's review

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adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

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missaayyy's review

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dark emotional sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

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kyannabrown's review against another edition

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emotional reflective relaxing sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I felt disappointed by the ending even though I enjoyed reading the book. I really enjoyed the game designing portions of the book.

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vonrxyes's review

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challenging emotional sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

i can’t decide if i enjoyed this or not, lots of it made me mad, lots of it made me cry. all i can say is i couldn’t put it down, for better or for worse.

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tedz's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging emotional funny inspiring sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

4.25 Sterne!

Auf Englisch gelesen.

Eine sehr interessante Lektüre, mit tollen, glaubhaft menschlichen Charakteren und nostalgischen Inhalten der Videospielindustrie!
(Mein kleines Videospielherz hat bei jeder Referenz, mit der auch ich groß geworden bin, die mich begleitet oder geformt hat, höher geschlagen!)

Es braucht ein paar Seiten und Kapitel bis man sich in den Protagonisten wiederfindet, mit ihnen lacht, mitfiebert und weint, gerade für Leser*innen die nicht gewandt in klassische Literatur und den Anfängen von Videospielen sind, kann es etwas dauern bis das Lesen angenehmer wird und man nicht mehr aktiv Seiten umblättern muss.
Jedoch zieht man Verlauf der Geschichte schnell Vergleiche zum eigenem Leben, den eigenen Ambitionen und Eigenschaften und sehnt sich schlussendlich nach solch einer freundschaftlich, zwischenmenschlich, aufrichtig und schmerzenden Liebe, wie sie dort mit Worten beschrieben wird!
Es kann hier und da etwas im Leseflow stocken, da es repetitiv um die selben Konflikte, Hemmungen und Ängste der Protagonisten geht, was die Darstellung des gemeinsam geteilten und getrennten Leben von Sadie, Sam, Marx und ihren Liebsten und dem bitter-süßen Ende nicht die Glaubhaftigkeit nimmt!
Ein paar Entscheidungen, „Grudges“ und Handlungen schienen mir etwas unpassend und nicht Charakterentsprechend und im Konflikt und zu großen Kontrast mit vorherigen Handlungen (Sadie), jedoch ist es deutlich sichtbar mit wie viel Vorsicht und Aufmerksamkeit jeder Charakter entwickelt und geschrieben worden ist!
Jede kleine oder noch so große Rolle wurde gut durchdacht und ehrlich gestaltet, mit Fehlern, Problemen, Erfahrungen und individuellen Eigenschaften!

Allgemein ein sehr angenehmer Schreibstil, mit guter Geschwindigkeit, der die Klugheit (Havard-/Cambridge Studenten mit interessanten Denkweisen/Fähigkeiten, die überdurchschnittlich schlau sind), die Gerissenheit und Tiefe der Charaktere sehr gut und authentisch rüberbringt!
Allerdings haben mich die vielen Fremdwörter, insbesondere die hohe Anzahl an deutschen Wörten, oft stocken lassen, was für Muttersprachler störend sein könnte!

Ein sehr schönes Buch mit dem ich mich wahrscheinlich in ein paar Jahren, mit mehr Reife und Erfahrung noch besser identifizieren kann!

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wooblatoober's review

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challenging emotional funny hopeful inspiring reflective sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

i really enjoyed zevin’s ability to portray characters with generosity & portray ever-changing relationships, even with rifts, and just overall make everything feel real.

i’m obsessed with marx’s fruit tree motif. he’s ever-giving, and he’s beautiful, and he’s soft. the love he gives freely is so beautiful and bountiful and juicy and sweet, but not too much so, like a fuyu persimmon. for now, maybe because of my own experiences, i’m more hung up on marx’s death than sam & sadie’s stories and relationship.

zevin does an AMAZING job of showing how people and their relationships change over time. it’s crazy how much my opinions on the characters changed over time, waxing and waning and flipping between them.

specifically, i loved sadie at the beginning and felt sorry for how she was being manipulated, then disliked her toward the end, which isn’t even how every reader might feel about her, since she seems like such a real person, and real people have some people that like them and some people that don’t. conversely, i was a bit annoyed by sam for the beginning, thinking he seemed like any other toxic smart guy who thinks he’s smarter than everybody else, until i started LOVING him toward the middle, then i was a bit annoyed by him again by the end for his lack of communication, though i was proud of his growth and baby steps in communication.

this book reads like creative nonfiction. it’s remarkable. my only small complaint is a major spoiler (everything i’ve marked “spoiler” is a major spoiler though), and that’s basically the end of the book. tl;dr for the spoiler, i felt like the ending was just over the line of a little bit too late in the back-and-forth of the story to feel satisfied by it. i felt empty at the end like i do out of all the best books, but that emptiness came from events that happened before the ending of the book, and the ending was overshadowed by that and felt too little too late.

by sadie and sam’s happy ending, which implies that they’ll fight again in the future but will work to be better to themselves and each other, i was kinda over it. overshadowed by marx’s death, i had become done with sadie’s paralysis and easy-to-anger attitude as well as her ability to hold a grudge that outshines teen sam’s, and done with sam’s refusal to communicate, even if they had experiences or mental illnesses that facilitated those actions (or lack thereof).

Content Warnings

swanderella's review

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challenging emotional informative reflective slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

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laughingrevolution's review

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emotional hopeful reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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victoria_bnb's review

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emotional

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

1.0

I do not like the characters like everyone else seems too. The character felt a little bit flat to me. The didn't have much character to begin with but they also do not grow as people over time, this spans 20+ years and they are almost the same people they were in the beginning (if not worse).
I would've liked to see their relationship develop,not even in a romantic way, but more caring and relying on each other. instead of 20+ years of them calling each other "friends"

It is particularly aggravated me because Zevin writes about how great their friendship is but we don't ever see it. We see them as business partners and then not talking to each other and holding grudges for years.
Sadie specifically annoyed me, she was so hypocritical. Sam was not a great person but had "reasons". And when they were upset they never just talked it out, and then let it go.
Marx was the flatest character of them all he is "perfect and everyone loves him even his exes." He got treated badly but didn't care, and continued to take care of the people treating him that way and never corrected bad behavior.
Also Dov is the worst, he was abusive and manipulative (and an IDF solider) and that was just glossed over. This book as a whole did not do enough to criticizehis behavior. He continued to be a part of Sadie's life, after everything he did but she stops talking to Sam of all people.

I did like the overall writing. It was an easy read except some parts, there was too much detail or prose.

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