The following version of this book was used to create the guide: Straub, Emma. This Time Tomorrow. Riverhead Books, 2022.

Alice visits her terminally ill father, Leonard Stern, in the hospital. She does this whenever she has time off work as an admissions officer at Belvedere School. Alice attended Belvedere, a private school, herself. Leonard made his fortune from a bestselling book called Time Brothers.

After the visit, Alice texts her mother, Serena, to tell her that Leonard seems the same. Alice was raised by her father after her mother left them. Alice heads to her boyfriend Matt’s apartment. She is worried Matt might propose to her soon since she does not feel they are a good fit.

At work the next day, Alice chats with her colleague, Emily. Both are sorry their boss, Melinda, is retiring. As Alice sorts through applications for prospective students, she recognizes the surname of her high school crush, Tommy. She emails Tommy to schedule an interview and looks forward to seeing him again.

On the way to dinner with Matt, Alice calls her best friend, Sam. She and Sam rarely see one another since Sam is busy with her husband and kids. At the end of a fancy yet unsatisfactory dinner, Matt pops the question. Alice turns him down at once. Matt seems relieved. Privately, Alice worries that she is a lone wolf, just like her father.

Alice interviews Tommy Joffey and his wife. Alice notices that he is just as attractive as ever. The next day, Alice turns forty. She has dinner with Sam, who gifts her a tiara with a photo of them from Alice’s sixteenth birthday. The gift makes Alice sad.

After her birthday dinner, Alice heads to a bar alone. She gets drunk, then heads to her childhood home on Pomander Walk. Alice passes out in the guardhouse.

Alice wakes up in her childhood bedroom. Her father wishes her a sixteenth birthday. Alice has no clue how she managed to time travel but she is thrilled to see her father young and healthy again. Leonard walks Alice to Belvedere for an SAT prep class. Before the class, Alice explains her situation to Sam, who believes her at once. After the class, Alice smokes a cigarette with Tommy.

Leonard takes Sam and Alice out for hot dogs, then ice cream. Sam suggests that he write another time travel novel but with a female protagonist. Alice and Leonard visit the Natural History Museum, then watch a movie before meeting Sam once again for dinner.

Leonard tells the girls to have fun at Alice’s party. He will be at a science fiction convention. At the party, Alice decides to do things differently than the first time she turned sixteen. Instead of doing drugs, she sleeps with Tommy. Then, Alice takes Tommy and Sam to Leonard’s convention. There, Alice reveals to her father that she is from the future. Leonard is delighted to hear this, given his own firsthand experience with time travel. In the cab ride home, Alice makes Tommy promise to marry her someday.

The next day, Alice wakes up as a forty-year-old once more. In this life, she is wealthy, married to Tommy, and has two kids. Alice can barely stand her own stuffy birthday party. She pulls Sam aside and tells her that she is travelling in time. Sam lends her a copy of Dawn of Time, Leonard’s second novel. Alice heads to her childhood home to read it. She can tell Leonard was thinking of her when he wrote it.

Alice continues jumping between her sixteen-year-old and forty-year-old selves. No matter what advice she gives her father, Leonard ends up sick. Alice begins to recognize patterns in her time travel adventures. If she sleeps with Tommy and tells him to marry or date her, she ends up with him at age forty. Most of all, Alice loves revisiting all her favorite spots from her youth. She relishes the transitory nature of her existence.

One day, as a forty-year-old, Alice decides to visit Sam in New Jersey. Overwhelmed, she breaks down crying. Sam comforts her. Sam mentions that a former classmate of theirs, Kenji, just moved in nearby.

Alice visits Leonard in the hospital and—for the first time—he is awake. Leonard asks for reassurance that he was as good father. He explains that his own time travel adventures are responsible for his poor health now.

Alice makes one last trip back in time, to her sixteenth birthday. She decides to do nearly everything the same way it originally happened, except for a few things. First, she spends lunch videotaping father while asking him questions about his life. Next, at her party, she decides to tell Kenji she is sorry for the loss of his father. The two of them have a heartfelt conversation that ends in a hug.

When Alice wakes up at age forty, her life looks nearly the same as her original life, except she is the boss at Belvedere and Leonard has a partner named Debbie. Alice and Debbie take turns watching over Leonard, who was recently moved back to his home. The day he dies, Alice tells him she loves him and will miss him. Shortly after, Kenji texts Alice to express his condolences and let her know he is always free to talk. Alice feels a general sense of hope for her future.