10 books like Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow to read next

“There is a time for any fledgling artist where one’s taste exceeds one’s abilities. The only way to get through this period is to make things anyway. And it is possible that, without Sam (or someone like him) pushing her through this period, Sadie might not have become the game designer she became. She might not have become a designer at all.“

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow

Books like Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow should come with a little note telling you to take a week off after reading.

Now I’ve had enough time to just sit with my thoughts, I’m ready to say: if you love a good story, read this.

If you find joy in creating what didn’t exist before and diving into the depths of your imagination, absolutely read this. If you love video games, you need to read this.

Gabrielle Zevin’s bestseller is a marvellously crafted novel that’s clearly the result of an awe-inspiring amount of work. And that’s fitting, really, because the book is very much about work – in the most creative, all-encompassing, and collaborative way. I adored it.

If, like me, you’ve been struggling to adjust to the real world after finishing Tomorrow x3, in this post I’ve shared ten of the best books to read next after Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow.

Some of these books are about creativity and projects that require everything the creator can give, but there are other books about friendship, collaboration, and unique types of love in the list too. Enjoy!

1. A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara

A Little Life has become known as the book with content warnings. Tomorrow x3 is also a book with content warnings. That said, these warnings are milder (read: Zevin’s book is less likely to rip your heart out and tear it into minuscule pieces.)

In both books, things don’t always go the way you want them to. Sad things happen and fortunes change, even in a sea of successes and joys. But that sounds a lot like life, really.

Like Tomorrow, A Little Life is a group coming-of-age story, in its case, about four bright and ambitious central male characters, who meet at college as randomly assigned roommates and remain crucial parts of each other lives.

Don’t read A Little Life and expect an easy read with a happy ending. But all this said, I still think it’s a book that offers beauty and – at times – a glimmer of hope.

2. The Overstory by Richard Powers

Another book that Tomorrow reminded me of is Pulitzer Prize Winner The Overstory; specifically, the sections about Neelay, a coding prodigy, a game company owner, and, like Sam in Tomorrow, a disabled person.

In The Overstory, Neelay creates a series of word-building games called Mastery. I loved his description of the idea for the game, showing his ambition to infuse pixels with the wonder of nature and humanity:

“The player will start in an uninhabited corner of a freshly assembled new Earth. He’ll be able to dig mines, cut down trees, plow fields, construct houses, build churches and markets and schools—anything his heart desires and his legs can reach. He’ll travel down all the spreading branches of an enormous technology tree, researching everything from stone working to space stations, free to follow any ethos, to make whatever culture floats his state-of-the-art boats.”

The Overstory

3. Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel

From the bestselling author of Station Eleven and The Glass Hotel, The Sea of Tranquility is a stunning novel of art, time travel, love, and plague.

In this unique and wonderfully creative book from 2022, Emily St. John Mandel takes us from Vancouver Island in 1912 to a dark colony on the moon five hundred years later, unfurling a story of humanity across centuries and space.

4. Pachinko by Min Jin Lee

Some readers on Reddit have compared Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow to Pachinko, and after raising my eyebrows… I can see it.

Focused on a Korean immigrant family over four generations in 20th-century Japan, Pachinko is an incredibly good book about changing fortunes and evolving family ties. (The group in Tomorrow is so close-knit it’s essentially a family too, really).

Pachinko is one of those remarkably epic books that manages to encompass such a sheer amount of time, change, and human emotion. It’s one of my all-time favourites.

5. Normal People by Sally Rooney

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow isn’t about romance, really. But it is about love. And it’s also about the difficulties of communicating our love. For these reasons, it’s a good match with Normal People.

Are we in a relationship or not? I thought you liked her? Why don’t you like me?

This is the classic modern (and very dysfunctional) love story. Oh, how reading Normal People will make you want to scream at its characters. But we’ve probably all been there.

6. Greenwood by Michael Christie

“…Liam Greenwood has often thought that people like clear wood best because they need to see time stacked together. Years pressed against years, all orderly and clean. Free from obstruction or blemish. The way our own lives never are.”

Another book about trees on this list? Yep. Greenwood is one of my favourite books of the last few years. It’s a stunning story of one family’s journey to vast riches, betrayal, and transformation in a dangerous and changing world.

Subtly echoing the theme of creative work in Tomorrow, I loved how Greenwood magnificently depicts the loving attention of artisan craft (and contrasts it with the soulless destruction of big business).

7. Black Swan Green by David Mitchell

David Mitchell is another writer worth checking out if you loved Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow.

On Reddit, u/jordan_chez shared that Tomorrow x3 reminded them of Black Swan Green by David Mitchell in that “Gabrielle Zevin writes real people’s thoughts and motivations so well.”

Black Swan Green is a meditative novel of boyhood on the cusp of adulthood, tracking a single year in what is, for thirteen-year-old Jason Taylor, the sleepiest village in muddiest Worcestershire in a dying Cold War England, 1982.

But the thirteen chapters, each a short story in its own right, create an exquisitely observed world that is anything but sleepy.

8. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon

As one of the best books like Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay is a heartbreaking and nerdy book about two friends on a shared creative quest.

Joe Kavalier, a young Jewish artist, has just smuggled himself out of invaded Prague and landed in New York City. His Brooklyn cousin Sammy Clay is looking for a partner to create heroes, stories, and art for the latest novelty to hit America: the comic book.

Drawing on the characters’ own fears and dreams, and with exhilarating style and grace, Michael Chabon tells an unforgettable story of American romance and possibility.

9. Daisy Jones & The Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid

Um, what? you might be thinking. But I think this comparison works. Like Tomorrow, Daisy Jones & The Six is a book about creativity – about finding a style and identity individually, and trying to get the work done (and not blow everything up) collectively.

In this novel that reads like a music documentary you can’t stop watching, Daisy Jones & The Six became a sensation from the moment Daisy walked barefoot onto the stage.

Their sound defined an era. They played sold-out arenas from coast to coast. You couldn’t escape their music. Then, on 12 July 1979, it all came crashing down.

This is the story of the (fictional) band’s rise and fall, friendship and rivalry, ambition and heartbreak, as told by the intertwining voices of the band’s members.

10. The Future Is Yours by Dan Frey

The Future is Yours by Dan Frey is a sci-fi-ish version of Tomorrow x3, telling the story of two best friends who create a computer that can predict the future. But what they can’t predict is how it will tear their friendship – and society – apart.

Like Tomorrow, this book is about ambition, creativity, focus, and jealousy… but it’s also about an apocalypse. The question is: can they stop it?

Told through emails, texts, transcripts, and blog posts, this tech thriller chronicles the costs of innovation and asks how far you’d go to protect the ones you love – even from themselves.