Tomorrow

Written by Graham Swift

Narrated by Kate Reading

In his first novel sinceThe Light of Day, this Booker Prize winning–author gives us a new, quietly searing novel about the nature of family and about the combination of fact and story that can be made to form the most essential truths.

1:00 a.m. Paula Hook lies awake next to her husband, Mike; her sixteen-year-old twins, Kate and Nick, are asleep down the hall. When the day begins, she and Mike will share a secret with their children that may change all their lives forever. Paula wants Kate and Nick to know a long hidden truth, a "bed-time story" that will reveal not just the secret but the often unexpected course of the lives—hers and Mike's, their families', the twins'—that have been profoundly, if not always knowingly, shaped by it.

In an eloquent, emotion-filled narrative of Paula's life with Mike, she describes both the certain and the surprising ways that having children can mean "reconstructing the world." In Tomorrow,Graham Swift gives us not only a quietly searing novel about the nature of family but also a dazzling meditation on how little it takes to transform the world.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
• Release date: Jan 1, 2006
• ISBN: 9781481565752

Graham Swift

Graham Swift was born in 1949. He is the author of eleven novels, most recently Here We Are; three collections of short stories, including the highly praised England and Other Stories; and Making an Elephant, a book of essays, portraits, poetry and reflections on his life in writing. With Waterland he won the Guardian Fiction Prize and with Last Orders the Booker Prize. Mothering Sunday became a worldwide bestseller and won the Hawthornden Prize for best work of imaginative literature. All three novels were made into films. His books have appeared in over thirty-five languages.  

[seeword · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The Goodreads reviews seem to be "loved it or hated it" with a lot of readers viewing it as an actual letter by a mother to her children, rather than as the reflections of a woman during a sleepless night. She reviews her life, her marriage, her children, her parents, her in-laws, a cat, all her relationships. Once again I am amazed at how much Graham Swift can pack into a short space (in this case 255 pages). At the end, we are left to ponder about what happens "tomorrow" when she and her husband reveal what she considers a major family secret to their son and daughter (sixteen year old twins).

Whether or not one loves or hates this book may depend a great deal on the reader's perspective. I liked (not loved) this book, but not as much as the other two I've read by this author (Mothering Sunday and England and Other Stories). I'll read more by Swift, Waterland is on my chair-side stack. Library book.

[pdebolt_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I thought this book had a promising premise; however, it soon became repetitive and tedious. Paula Hook, the narrator, spends one entire night, with her husband asleep beside her, recounting the family past leading up to the "big reveal" to their teen-aged children that will occur in the morning. There are so many ways this novel went wrong - it is well written, but lacks the necessary ingredients to make it even marginally interesting. I can't imagine how yucky it would be to learn the extensive details of their parents' sex life and how ultimately boring to recount their genealogy over and over again. The secret to be revealed is almost a ho-hum after the anticipation of what will be learned by the twins.

[lunarreader · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

OK, who did know that Graham Swift is a woman? I didn't. By the look of his picture he sure looks a man. But he must be a woman. Must.
How can one explain otherwise the book Tomorrow? This book is one long stream of consciousness by a woman on the night before a crucial day in the life of her family: her life, but surely the life or her man and her children.
How is it possible that these typical female thoughts (at least, they look typical female to me, but then again, i'm also a man) can be written down in this way by a man?
But it is a great book. Of course one could easily imagine another end. One could easily imagine another situation, but the description, the way the story unfolds, the small things.... It's Graham Swift and yes, it is a masterpiece.
Only one character but references to many others, like Otis the cat, and yet it tells about all major themes and questions of life: childhood, parenthood, trust, lies, responsibility, care, biology, nature and nurture.
A brilliant point of view taken by Swift here and even more brilliant in the complete setup.
Read this book. Surely if you are a woman, and then tell me if you agree.
Thanks.

[thorold_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

A mother spends a sleepless night reflecting on the big family secret that is going to be revealed to the kids the next day. Very nicely done, as you would expect from Swift, but ultimately it doesn't seem to amount to all that much.

[edwinbcn · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The novels of Graham Swift often hinge on an infinitismal moment in time, that defines the transition between one state of being and another state of being. The author picks the exact turning point moment between two episodes in a person's life.

The success of his novels depend on the degree of and his ability to maintain suspense, and goad the reader to accept further delay, as the novel builds up and describes all that goes on before the pivotal moment. In some of Graham Swift's works this tension is maintained better than in other novels. In Tomorrow, the story line development is reasonably strong, but the nature of the momentuous change can be predicted from very early in the novel, which weakens the suspense.

Technically, therefore, Tomorrow is perhaps ver well done, but ultimately, the novel is not very interesting.

[eglinton_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Sometime children aren't quite ready for the freighted unburdening of their prehistory that their parents may try to inflict on them. Whoa, too much detail there, mum. And sometimes the reader doesn't quite settle in to the voice and subject an author sets out. And so here; Swift's monologue is well-turned and clearly going somewhere of some interest, but I didn't connect and so put it aside unfinished. Family saga, big reveal, 50s through 80s state of play, not sure what more...

[georg0miggel · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

I bought this book because I really liked "Last Orders" by the same author. But after reading this one I felt cheated. I can enjoy books without suspense or a surprising ending. But I feel treated badly by the author if he/she announces a surprise and you wait for it fruitlessly. I know this may be considered as a spoiler, but - believe me - there is nothing to spoil.

[florenceart · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I'm afraid I found it difficult to feel empathy for the narrator, whose problems seem to me to be blown quite out of proportion. I was also annoyed by her wandering and repetitive style and the way she kept hinting that she will make some mind-blowing revelations later on, and sometimes felt like shaking her by the shoulders and scream at her to get to the point! The book is well-written, but not enough to bring interest to a rather ordinary and unexciting story.

[stonelaura · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

It is a credit it Graham Swift’s writing style that I, mostly, made it through this story at all. During the span of one evening the narrator, Paula Hook, reveals, in painstaking and inappropriate detail, the story of her and her husband Mike’s meeting, their family histories, her one night infidelity, and their infertility problems. You will already know as soon as you begin reading (or listening) that this infertility problem is somehow resolved because Paula’s entire dialog is really a preparation for the talk she and Mike will be having the next day with their now sixteen year-old twins. The denouement, that it is not the virile veterinarian that was so comforting to their lost and recovered cat, Otis, as well as to Paula, but an anonymous in vitro process is a letdown that is only slightly less off-putting because it has been preceded by so many intimate details that no child, in vitro or not, would care to know about their parents.

[bobbieharv · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Well-written, but ultimately a long drawn-out portentous pondering by a woman about what turns out not to be a very big deal - telling their children the truth about their father.

[lynnb_64 · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

This book just didn't work for me. The story is basically a monologue where the mother of twins lies awake one night, knowing that in the morning, she and her husband will reveal a family secret to their 16 year old twins.

SPOILER ALERT....

My problem with the story is that, if the mother was that conflicted about artificial insemination, she wouldn't have gone through with it. Her views on "real" parenthood are so far removed from the route she chose, it's difficult to understand why she did it in the first place. There was just too big a disconnect between the thoughts and actions of the narrator to make the story believable in any way.

[amcgregor_24 · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

Very disappointing. I am a big Graham Swift fan but I hated this book. I found the narrator irritating, self-satisfied and self indulgent.