I Love You Don't Die: A Novel by Jade Song (Hardcover) (PREORDER)

Fiction - Literary - Coming of Age - LBGTQ+ - Bisexual - City Life

RELEASE DATE: 3/17/2026 (WILL SHIP DIRECTLY FROM OUR SUPPLIER'S WAREHOUSE AND ARRIVE 1-2 DAYS AFTER THE RELEASE DATE) 

Acclaimed author Jade Song (Chlorine) returns with her latest literary exploration: a lyrical, poignant, and heartfelt novel about the meaning of love, friendship, debt, depression, and death in New York City—a coming-of-age for a new generation, in the vein of Sally Rooney and Ottessa Moshfegh.

For as far back as she can remember, Vicky has been fascinated and obsessed with death as the only inevitable thing in life. From living above a Chinatown funeral parlor to working at a celebrity start-up for bespoke urns, she has surrounded herself with death—in her home, in her work, and in her ever-growing collection of zhizha, paper creations meant to be burned for the dead, adorning the walls of her apartment. Yet, though living in Manhattan and working her dream job is all she ever wanted, she still struggles to have meaningful connections—or find any meaning at all—in her life. Too often she spends the day in bed, only drawn out from time to time by her best (and only) friend, Jen.

That changes when a dating app leads her into a throuple with an artist and a labor organizer, who offer exactly the kind of love she needs. For some time, it’s perfect, but no one understands better than Vicky that all things must end. As doubts grow over the love in her life, her friendship with Jen, and her professional success, the oddly comforting abstraction of death starts becoming something else altogether. With everything beginning to feel hollow and temporary, Vicky must decide how to keep moving forward. To try and hold on to what she has, or to once again do what she does best: destroy.

AUTHOR BIO: 

Jade Song is an artist, filmmaker, and writer whose award-winning debut novel Chlorine was selected as a New York Times Editor's Choice and translated into multiple languages. The Black List selected Song's adapted screenplay of Chlorine for its annual Writers Lab. Song pole dances and lives with too many books.

"This book was viscerally unnerving and I could not put it down." -- Sarah Gailey, author of The Echo Wife

"Ren Yu is a fierce young woman who's dreamed of mermaids ever since she can remember--dreams so vivid that the first touch of water in a swimming pool alters her life forever, sending her down a path that's both beautiful and frightening. Chlorine isn't just a coming of age story. It's the tale of transformation from human to something wilder and more transcendent. It's about love and longing and the willingness to do anything to become who you truly are." -- Richard Kadrey, New York Times bestselling author of the Sandman Slim series

"Ms. Song is good on the growing pains of young adulthood...[This is] a book that enlivens its coming-of-age yarn with a touch of mystery and a twist of myth." -- The Economist

"This fantastically strange, explosive debut novel entrances even as it unsettles. It's so brilliantly written." -- Buzzfeed

"In Song's disturbing and visionary debut, a child pushed too hard to succeed becomes a monster of her own making... The body horror is striking, as is Song's prose, in which she riffs on the various ways the team members are "mutilated" ("We mutilated our beauty, though this sense of beauty was an outdated version defined by narrow wrists and bird bones"). It's a singular coming-of-age." -- Publishers Weekly

"A notable debut that marks a distinctive career to watch." -- Kirkus Reviews

"A visceral and startling debut novel by Jade Song, Chlorine is a portrait of ambition, defiance and longing set in the world of competitive swimming... Song invites readers to enter into Ren's obsessions not with judgment or disgust, but with an understanding that is surprisingly tender in the face of the novel's abrasion." -- Shelf Awareness

"Like the scent of chlorine on one's skin, this not-to-be-missed debut novel lingers." -- Library Journal (starred review)