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Video Games Beat Life In ‘Tomorrow, And Tomorrow, And Tomorrow’
Young programmers strike gold when they create ‘the Harry Potter of games’ in Gabrielle Zevin’s hit novel
Are video games fairer than life? If so, why? And do their thrills expire as players outgrow pursuits that enchanted them as adolescents?
Questions like these drive Gabrielle Zevin’s dark and baggy fairy tale about two brilliant young programmers-turned-game-designers who strike gold when they create “the Harry Potter of games” but suffer multiple tragedies amid their successes.
Game boy meets game girl
At the age of 12 Sam Masur saw his mother die in a car accident that mangled his left foot and left him with a limp. He withdrew into video games, rarely speaking, until 11-year-old Sadie Green arrived in the game room at a Los Angeles children’s hospital, where he was recovering from the crash and her sister was being treated for leukemia. Nurses saw Sam come to life while playing Super Mario Bros. with Sadie, and at their suggestion, she spent many more hours with him.
This opener may sound like the setup for a teen weepie like The Fault in Our Stars, but Zevin has different aims in her bestselling Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow (Knopf…
