Publishers Weekly
10/23/2023
Literary agent Stovall debuts with the penetrating story of an erstwhile friendship. Khaki Oliver, who is Black, and Fiona Davies, who is white, last spoke to each other a decade ago. In the present day, Khaki receives an invitation to Fiona’s baby shower for her adopted Black daughter. As Khaki waffles on whether to attend, she plans a mixtape of punk songs from her adolescence. While playing the records, she remembers her and Fiona’s frenzied days as high school outcasts in New Jersey and their split after Khaki left for college in Los Angeles. Stovall devotes many pages to the nuances of punk’s many subgenres as Khaki navigates the punk scene in L.A., where she develops an eating disorder and feels a growing resentment over Fiona never visiting her there. As the narration winds back to the present, Stovall elucidates the reasons behind the friends’ break and reveals what they still have in common. The meandering narrative starts off slow, but it’s lifted by Stovall’s irony-spiked odes to an impassioned, punk-tinged youth (one band’s vocalist “flip-flop between shouting diatribes against the military industrial complex and belting broken-hearted love songs with a twang”). Patient readers will find plenty of rewards. (Feb.)
From the Publisher
Nylon, A Must-Read Book of the Month
Messenger, A Must-Read Book of the Month
Named a Most Anticipated Book by Elle, Nylon, Bookshop, Goodreads, Electric Literature, The Millions, and Zibby Mag
"An impressively strong and inventively structured debut . . . I Love You So Much It's Killing Us Both is a rare thing: a genuinely successful rock novel . . . This is an excellent novel, compassionate and filled with a sparkling intelligence about the human condition." —Michael Schaub, NPR
"Nostalgic yet fiercely relevant . . . this book is a coming-of-age treasure." —Lauren Puckett-Pope, Elle
"An emotionally perceptive debut." —Keziah Weir, Vanity Fair
"If Mariah Stovall’s debut doesn’t have you pining for the past and reliving your own coming-of-age era, you may just be the Tin Man looking for a heart. Centering on a tender and tumultuous friendship and its killer soundtrack, this story is dynamic, agile and auspicious.” —Karla J. Strand, Ms.
“Stovall’s writing is gorgeous. Every word is perfectly crafted and the first sentence of chapter one lets you know you’re going to be on a wild ride.”—Archuleta Chisolm, Black Girl Nerds
"A novel that has plenty to say about how music can reshape our lives and the lives of those around us." —Vol. 1 Brooklyn
"Stovall has constructed what is maybe the most authentic portrayal of 'punk' I’ve read in literature . . . It is the combination of Stovall’s sharp observational eye, poetic instincts, and deep commitment to the character of Khaki that make I Love You So Much It’s Killing Us Both such a raw, impressive debut . . . One of the best Punk Rock Novels we’ve ever gotten." —Ellie Kovach, You Don't Need Maps
"It brings together these two ideas—punk music and complicated friendships—in a whirlwind of dizzying, beautiful prose . . . I Love You So Much is an astonishingly expansive novel, one that explores a multitude of ideas—obsession, eating disorders, the punk scene, and a friendship teetering between destruction and care—with remarkable ease. Stovall’s command over language is evident in every line, and I found that sentences were stuck in my head for weeks, much like the perennial soundtrack that Khaki lives within." —Nirica Srinivasan, Write or Die
"Through intimate and careful observation of Khaki and her actions, Stovall creates a persuasive story focusing on the main character's inner world . . . The book presents a heart-warming adventure of friendship, music, and humanity using poetical expressions and poignant contemplations.” —Kiefer Jones, Books & Review
"There is so much bang for your buck in Stovall’s debut. It is an ode to growing up and letting music guide you . . . It’s a captivating play on friendship, anxiety, and the beauty of music." —Debutiful
"I Love You So Much It’s Killing Us Both feels like the ribbons of a mixtape unraveling in the knot of your stomach. This is a harrowing story of music, mental illness, growing up and apart, and finding yourself in the unique position of truly loving someone to death.” —Kenzie Hampton, The Bookshop, Electric Literature
"I Love You So Much It’s Killing Us Both burns brightly with familiar feelings of angst, uncertainty, and passion." —Michael Welch, Chicago Review of Books
"A powerful testimony to the enduring violence of harmful relationships and the profoundly difficult task of recovery." —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"The rhythmic and lyrical quality of Stovall’s writing parallels the underlying playlist of punk music . . . This poignant tale explores illness, the role of music in one's life, and the blurred lines between friendship, sisterhood, codependency, and love." —Booklist
"The penetrating story of an erstwhile friendship . . . Readers will find plenty of rewards." —Publishers Weekly
"Mariah Stovall's prose sounds like driving in a car with your best friend, volume up high on your favorite song. I Love You So Much . . . resurrected feelings I had almost forgotten about what it means to be young in a hard, and nonetheless beautiful, world." —Vauhini Vara, author of the Pulitzer Prize finalist The Immortal King Rao
“I Love You So Much It's Killing Us Both is a funny, biting, and big-hearted coming of age story. Enter these pages for Mariah Stovall's witty renderings of the contradictions of millennial youth and for her lovingly excavated cultural artifacts; stay for her poignant reflections on what it means to grow into an adult, to be a friend, and to belong to our moment in history.” —Sanjena Sathian, author of Gold Diggers
“You don't need a prior relationship to the sounds and saints of punk, emo, and hardcore to get swept into the currents of Stovall's pulsing storytelling. Her debut artfully dilates the cruel intimacy of one teenage friendship into a dark but tender treatise on hunger, compulsion, and identity. If you've ever loved—a person, a hobby, a song—so intensely it hurt; this mosh pit of a novel will offer you both sanctuary and feedback.” —Stephen Kearse, music critic and author of Liquid Snakes
“Mariah Stovall’s heady debut plays an addictive game of connect-the-dots between two estranged friends through a galaxy of shared pop-culture references and personal history. I Love You So Much It's Killing Us Both is a spiraling meditation on the porousness of music and memory, the blurred lines between obsession and friendship, and the hearts we must break in order to grow—including our own.” —Emma Brodie, author of Songs In Ursa Major
“Mariah Stovall's I Love You So Much It's Killing Us Both turns up the volume on contemporary literary fiction in the best, most mesmerizing way. This book is a blazing riff, completely on fire from the first propulsive chord. Khaki Oliver leads us on a captivating ride; she is, simply put, one of the most compelling narrators we have seen in quite some time.” —Jordy Rosenberg, author of Confessions of the Fox
"Lyrical, musical, and brilliantly offbeat, this debut traces the aches and pains of young adulthood with such clarity I couldn’t help but be transported back to my own adolescence. Our narrator, Khaki Oliver, is angry and lonely, brimming with nostalgia, and laugh-out-loud funny. She yearns, longs, hurts, and turns alive on the page; I feel lucky to have spent the duration of this book with her." —Diana Clarke, author of The Hop and Thin Girls
Kirkus Reviews
★ 2023-11-04
Moving between New York City and Los Angeles, Stovall’s debut novel follows a Black millennial woman as she reckons with her past.
Living alone and working behind a museum’s welcome desk, Khaki Oliver receives a card from Fiona Davies, her white best friend from high school in a New York suburb. Reading Fiona’s baby shower invitation floods her with unwelcome memories, so instead of responding, she begins to craft a mixtape—obsessively replaying songs and reminiscing about the punk shows she attended as a teen embroiled in a distinctly unhealthy, codependent relationship with Fiona: “I try to remember what Fiona is. A full-body rush. A cursed experiment in collaboration. Someone to share things—a piece of gum; life—with.” Their friendship was all-consuming, an intoxicating blend of devotion, secrets, and lies, at once sustaining and destroying them both. When Khaki immersed herself in punk fandom—typically white, older, male—she experienced a dislocation between her sense of self and the ways she was perceived and treated by those around her. Things came to a head between the young women, and Khaki crossed the country to attend college in L.A., embarking on life without Fiona. Khaki’s mental health dominates the novel, with depression, anxiety, and disordered eating looming large over nearly every page. In one chapter, Stovall represents those disorders formally with huge blocks of numbers evoking calories consumed and burnt, weight lost and gained, without specific accounting—literally taking up space on the page the same way disordered thinking takes up mental space. In the aftermath of Fiona’s letter, Khaki’s ability to function wavers, and she reflects that “because of her, I’ve trained myself not to develop attachments to human beings. This seems to have improved my health. The stability is hard won and precarious. I’m better without her.”
A powerful testimony to the enduring violence of harmful relationships and the profoundly difficult task of recovery.
