Book Review by Robert Wiersema This Time Tomorrow by Emma Straub Every so often, I’ll read a book so delightful that I find myself stymied: I want to tell everyone I know to read it, but I don’t want to tell them anything about it, for fear of reducing its effect. Such is the case with This Time Tomorrow, the new novel from New York City writer Emma Straub: I want to press copies into the hands of everyone I know, while at the same time urging them not to read anything about it, not even the book jacket. It’s not a matter of spoilers, but one of sheer enjoyment: the less you know about This Time Tomorrow, the greater its impact. There’s a moment early in the book – about which I knew nothing before I began reading – that is so wonderful, so unexpected, it will take your breath away. So, here’s the rub: if you’re intrigued, or just looking for a highly recommended book to read, don’t read any further in this review. Pick up a copy of Emma Straub’s This Time Tomorrow, and enjoy. If you want a bit more information, or more of a traditional review, you’re of course welcome to continue reading. With her new novel, Straub takes a slight turn away from the closely observed realismof her previous, bestselling books to incorporate a new element: time travel. No, she hasn’t turned to science fiction. Instead, Straub uses the time travel elements to supplement her realism, to turn it on its head and increase its depth, while still rooting the story in the realistic and the familiar. The novel begins with Alice approaching her 40th birthday. She has built a solid, if unremarkable life: sheworks at theManhattan private school which she attended as a child, rather than becoming the artist she wanted to be. She has a decent relationship with her boyfriend Matt and a close friendship with her old friend Sam, despite their lives going in different directions (“she had children and lived in New Jersey, each of which on their own would have been tricky odds to overcome”). Her main worry, though, is her father Leonard, who is hospitalized, his systems failing. “They were all waiting for her father to die.” Leonard, a semi-successful writer who raised Alice on his own, is one of the crucial touchstones in her life: even before he is gone, she is staggered by his absence. Until, that is, she wakes up the morning after her 40th birthday to find herself 16 years old again, with her father alive and vibrant, in his late 40s himself. Alice begins to experiment, bouncing between the present – where time continues its constant flow – and the past, where it is always her 16th birthday. With her years of experience and insight to guide her, can she change her life by making different choices? More important, can she save her father by changing his actions? It is difficult to express just how disarming and wonderful This Time Tomorrow really is. The time travel element is well handled, and less a matter of science fiction than it is of common fantasy − if I knew then what I know now. Straub writes with a sharp emotional acuity and a keen eye for both past and present, the way worlds shift and change without us even really being away of the transformation, the way lives unfold not momentously, but by single moments, single sentences, single relationships. It’s probably one of the most touching, delightful novels that you’ll read this year. 46 | www.snowbirds.org
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