Reviews tagging 'Violence'

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin

223 reviews

gossamer_lens's review

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emotional reflective sad medium-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

3.25

I have very mixed feelings about this book. As far as the writing style goes it is a 10/10 for me. I loved how the text bounced from past to present and from various points of view and perspectives. It was a book that kept me hooked on finishing it despite how much I disliked certain aspects of it. The writing style saved this book from being a 1.5 star.

So to talk about what I didn't like. 

Characters - I basically didn't like any character in the book except for one. I didn't hate them, but I found two of the central characters to be very dry and boring. They felt like a lot was going on, but they were written to be so "real life messy" that they felt like flat characters of the phrase "people are complicated." This is fine I guess, but in real life, I hope to never be closely tied to people who are so "complicated" that they cannot think to apologize, reach out, or otherwise acknowledge their flaws. I love my friends and family and I expect some basic courtesy in return at the very least. So it was hard when literally none of the characters in the book demonstrated any knowledge of the concepts of forgiveness, therapy, communication, or establishing boundaries. 

Plot - Overall this book didn't have a lot happen plot-wise. Some people do well in their careers and they all still have issues before, during, and after their successes. Not a problem... but when the book is so character based and I didn't love the characters... it made the writing style do a ton of the heavy lifting and left me hoping for more the whole way... only for it to end. Reflecting makes me realize it never gave me... "more".

Video games - I was super excited to read a book that centered video games. Over the last few years I have slowly become more and more aware of games. I was generally aware of them growing up but stuck to books. Then 2020 hit and my gamer husband (fiance at the time) got me invested in games by gifting me Animal Crossing. Since then I've played a bunch of cozy games, alongside a good smattering of fighters, platformers, Assasian's Creed, Indie games, etc. But besides that I've now watched hours upon hours of video game history video essays by developers, artists, and players. All this knowledge I thought would be helfpul and fun. 

Instead, it made me vastly annoyed as I found the author gave credit to the most basic and well-known games while making up a lot of games OR taking actual games and giving them new names as if the author herself invented them. This wouldn't have bugged me so much had the writing not come across as "super gamer is making up cool ideas". At the back of the book the author makes acknowledgment to several games and to me it read as "this is what I referenced" and implied that the unmentioned things were her own invention. Looking across discussion forms and listening to my fellow book clubers talk about this book, this seems like how a lot of people read the book and her acknowledgment. I guess I don't expect a fiction book to have an annotated bibliography... but I expect more of an author than taking people's real-life work and not acknowledging them at all AND changing the names of games to try and hide that she is essentially taking others work and writing those concepts into her work.

I could write a dissertation on what all this author drew from real-life artists' work without acknowledging it. But the most egregious example is probably that of her not giving credit to a Jewish woman whom she not just took the game from but also some of the surrounding circumstances. Just very odd and the Washington Post goes into it in more detail here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/books/2023/03/24/train-board-game-brenda-romero-tomorrow-and-tomorrow-and-tomorrow/

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ubalubi's review

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emotional reflective 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

4.5

It felt bittersweet to finish reading Tomorrow , and Tomorrow and Tomorrow. I fell in love with everyone and felt as though I was growing with them. I'll be rereading. This was excellent. 

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augie_'s review

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challenging dark emotional inspiring 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

5.0


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lindsayvale's review

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emotional funny lighthearted reflective sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0


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chile16's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging emotional funny informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0


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megshughes_13's review against another edition

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

2.5

just not my kind of thing.
written well but i just found it incredibly boring. 

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sweetlilly93's review

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emotional funny inspiring reflective 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

5.0

A bittersweet love story about that one friend that you love so so sooo much, it makes you hate them.

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megrob's review

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dark tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0


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bookswithlauren's review

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adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0


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librarianjennifer's review

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adventurous challenging emotional informative reflective sad
  • 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? It's complicated

4.25


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