Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin (2022 Vintage Kindle eBook 401pp)

 

“Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow” got a lot of publicity when it first was published in 2022. I recall quite a buzz for it online, people were calling it their favourite book of the year and a film version was said to be in the works. Then all the buzz went away and a few months later I found it on sale in Kindle eBook form for $1.99.

I have never read anything else by Gabrielle Zevin – I probably never even heard of her before this book came out, yet I understand this is her fifth novel and her previous book was a bestseller too.

I’m happy to report this book is worth all the positive PR it got on release. Sometimes you come across a book that’s so damn readable and enjoyable that if you had a chance you’d read it in one sitting – “Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow” is one of those books.

This is mainly the story of a man and a woman’s relationship over three decades or so. Sam and Sadie first meet as children when circumstances bring them both together in a Los Angeles hospital ward. They lose touch for several years then meet again when they are college students. A shared passion of theirs is videogames and it’s the videogame industry and the games themselves that act as a sort of backbone for the book.

Sam and Sadie end up developing video games together first for fun but then as a business. The stresses and strains of the work and life itself cause them to fall in and out with each other over the years. Grudges and misunderstandings are held for years and some are never forgiven. Sam longs for a romantic relationship with Sadie but instead they share an intense, stronger form of friendship as lovers come and go around them.

Both main characters have demons from their past that haunt them and affect their actions. We flash back and forwards in time and develop an understanding what makes them tick.

Sam’s college room-mate Marx plays a pivotal role in the story as he progresses from being a friend to a lynch-pin in the main couple’s videogaming empire. Parents, grandparents and siblings also feature in well-rounded roles.

The book covers the period from the late 1980s through to the present day. Progress is mainly shown by what the current hot videogame and videogame types are – having lived through that era I recognised most of them, a non-gamer may not quite understand some of that side of things perhaps.

The only thing a found perhaps less believable was that some of the games the main characters produce sell in their millions when they all seem more like what we’d call ‘Indie Games’ these days and probably wouldn’t set the world on fire.

As you might be able to tell, I very much enjoyed this book. It does go to some dark places in parts but never unnecessarily. It’s a good story well told.

 

Can I Have My Ball Back?

Can I Have My Ball Back? by Richard Herring (2022 Sphere hardcover 295pp)

 

Richard Herring is a UK comedian, writer and one of the pioneering podcasters. I was vaguely aware of some of his TV comedy in the 1990s but it was his RHLSTP podcast in recent years that brought him to my attention. In RHLSTP (Richard Herring’s Leicester Square Theatre Podcast) he interviews other comedians, writers and media figures usually in front of a live audience. Any listener in recent years would have heard him occasionally mentioning his brush with cancer and now he’s written a book on the experience.

Much of Herring’s comedy is based on the shock value of talking frankly about the usually unmentionable and asking the usually unaskable question. He translates that well to this book which attempts to remove the shame usually associated with talking about both cancer and genitals, no mean feat.

In the midst of one of the Covid lock-downs in 2021 Herrings notices his right testicle is swollen. Not wanting to make a fuss he consults a GP who tells him its probably nothing. Fortunately for him he’s sent for an ultra-sound scan anyway and not long after he receives a call telling him he may have testicular cancer. Soon he’s facing having the testicle removed and all the fears that come along with that.

Being Herring, he somehow makes comedy out of the situation – this is a very funny book with running gags and jokes throughout. The overstretched UK health system comes out as the real heroes while meanwhile the author is forced to face his own mortality and what it means to be a man in today’s society.

Every few pages the main text is interrupted by ‘break-out box’ type articles on the history, culture and science of testicles. Although these are mainly interesting, I did feel there were probably a little too many of these and they got in the way of the story.

After his testicle is removed (it turned out to be almost entirely cancer) he goes through the mental and physical challenges of chemotherapy and recovery. Eventually he runs a marathon raising money for a cancer charity. We leave him better but paranoid about what else might go wrong.

I enjoyed Herring’s story, he tells it well without making himself out a brave hero or survivor. He raises many points and provokes a lot of thoughts you may not otherwise have.

 

Chasm City

 

Chasm City by Alastair Reynolds (2020 Orbit softcover 598pp)

 

Since his debut novel “Revelation Space” was published around the turn of the century, UK author Alastair Reynolds has become one of the go-to authors for wide-screen, big idea, written Space Opera. He’s become increasingly popular for his works which include several ongoing series and stand-alone novels. “Chasm City” is one of his very early works, I believe it was his second published book and I’m afraid it seems to show that his abilities weren’t quite were he wanted them to be yet.

Set in the “Revelation Space” universe but not directly connected to any other book, “Chasm City” is an attempt to write some sort of SF ‘Noir’ detective story.

Former soldier and corporate security thug Tanner Mirabel tells the story, mainly in first person as he tries to track down and bring bloody revenge upon Argent Reivich. Reivich’s men have killed Tanner’s boss’s wife (also Tanner’s secret girlfriend) and therefore must die (etc).

The first third of the books details the chase on Mirabel’s native planet of “Sky’s Edge” as we learn a little of its history and religion before an exciting sequence involving a space elevator. So far so good. There’s a brief interlude when Tanner wakes up in a space habitat with amnesia and is tended to by a helpful nun. Its seems he’s travelled on an interstellar spacecraft as frozen cargo and now must pick up the chase once more. He makes his way down to the colony world of Yellowstone and its major settlement “Chasm City”.

Once a wonder of the galaxy, “Chasm City” his fallen on hard times due to the outbreak of the ‘Melding Plague’ which has made all but the most basic technology useless. Oddly the plague, which sounds fascinating, gets very little mention in the rest of the novel apart from a couple of scenes. Its mainly there as a backdrop and an excuse.

Once Tanner reaches the city, I found the book nosedived somewhat. Tanner’s dream sequences where possibly due to the effects of a religious indoctrination virus he relives the life of growing psychopath Sky Haussmann became more interesting and intriguing than the main plot.

Chasm City itself reads like a massive cliché – it’s the usual SF Cyberpunk deal where there’s millions of street-level poor people and hustlers whilst the rich live a high life literally above the rest.

Tanner finds himself hunted but as a bonus every woman he meets seems to become a devoted companion after about 5 minutes with him.

There’s some interesting stuff in there but I found most of the Chasm City scenes a big yawn. Its doesn’t really get much interesting again until, towards the end,  he and his new pals venture under the city into the chasm itself. Certain story threads finally mesh together and Tanner faces some big revelations about himself and his history. Most of these you can see coming a couple of hundred pages earlier.

The book does really read like an early draft by the author, perhaps written to flesh out some aspects of the “Revelation Space” universe before committing to it wholesale. It was interesting to be back in that particular setting again and this book isn’t quite as cold and clinical as “Revelation Space” itself, but maybe Space Opera is more his style.

It was entertaining but maybe too long and didn’t have as many neat ideas as I was expecting from this author.