I wish I had waited just a day to write my best-of list, because I would absolutely add this book. I loved being in this world, with these characters. Sam and Sadie meet when they are young, in a children’s hospital, in the 1980s – the time of The Oregon Trail (among other games). Sam is a patient, recovering from a terrible car accident that will have life-long repercussions for his feet (not to mention his mental state). Sadie’s older sister Alice has cancer (a highly treatable form of it, but cancer still), and Sadie must often find refuge in the hospital lounge to accommodate her sister’s varying moods. Sam and Sadie discover a shared love of games, and they instantly form an intense bond. It doesn’t take long to establish a pattern that repeats over and over for them – they spend the bulk of the novel coming together, then winding apart, and coming back together again. They love being around each other – until they find something new to drive them apart again. Their relationship, and its reboots, are the backbone of the novel.
Sam and Sadie are not the only compelling characters – the novel is full of complex characters that you will both love and love to hate. While at Harvard, Sam meets Marx, who will partner with Sam and Sadie in making innovative video games. Sadie goes to MIT, where she studies under Dov, her married professor – you can guess where that relationship leads. Although there is a lot of potential for tropes to abound in this novel, Zevin somehow manages to resist making any part of this novel feel trite. Maybe it is because a story about video games is also a story about modeling interactions between people. Despite being about creating alternate worlds, it’s deeply concerned with how we treat each other in the real one.
We have the pleasure of reading from both Sam and Sadie’s shifting perspectives, although it seems as though Sam is more firmly the narrator of this story. There are some intense emotional moments, and plenty of seemingly mundane moments that mark their lives and partnership together. The writer gives just enough subtle bits of foreshadowing to propel the book forward – while the book is primarily linear, there are some digressions (Sam and Sadie remembering their past) and occasional snippets from interviews set in the future (based on when the events are taking place). This pacing worked really well for me, giving me enough insight into the characters to feel at turns frustrated and in love with each of them. It manages to feel very intimate while also covering a decent amount of plot – the sort of book that is very hard to put down. It was both moving and amusing – I’d highly recommend this one for your next book club!