Things in Nature Merely Grow

By: Yiyun Li

Narrated by: Suzanne Toren

Yiyun Li’s remarkable, defiant work of radical acceptance as she considers the loss of her son James.

“There is no good way to say this,” Yiyun Li writes at the beginning of this audiobook.

“There is no good way to state these facts, which must be acknowledged. My husband and I had two children and lost them both: Vincent in 2017, at sixteen, James in 2024, at nineteen. Both chose suicide, and both died not far from home.”

There is no good way to say this—because words fall short. It takes only an instant for death to become fact, “a single point in a timeline.” Living now on this single point, Li turns to thinking and reasoning and searching for words that might hold a place for James. Li does what she can: “doing the things that work,” including not just writing but gardening, reading Camus and Wittgenstein, learning the piano, and living thinkingly alongside death.

This is an audiobook for James, but it is not an audiobook about grieving or mourning. As Li writes, “The verb that does not die is to be. Vincent was and is and will always be Vincent. James was and is and will always be James. We were and are and will always be their parents. There is no now and then, now and later, only, now and now and now and now.” Things in Nature Merely Grow is a testament to Li’s indomitable spirit.

A Macmillan Audio production from Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

Critic reviews

“In this intimate memoir, novelist Li remembers her teenage sons, James and Vincent, after their deaths by suicide . . . Li recounts both boys’ lives with palpable love and paints complex, distinct portraits of each . . . Readers who’ve dealt with their own tragedies will find comfort and understanding here.”
—Publishers Weekly

“Li manages the near impossible in a complex memoir that is as devastating as it is searingly insightful into the contours of grief and acceptance, recommended for anyone who is navigating the nonlinear timeline of loss.”
—Greta Rainbow, Bustle (Best New Books of Spring)

The truth of her experience

I have lost two children not to suicide but loss leaves a chasm and her words in some places were like a bridge. While her words were extremely painful, I applaud her bravery and vulnerability in telling her reality. I thank her also.

Children die, and parents go on living.

A description of the best we can do when things fall apart. I found myself struck by the repetition of the simple phrases - regarding hands, regarding how things in nature merely grow, regarding now and now and now - and held them close long after I finished reading.

The book was so well written, deep and sincerely moving.

Loved this book. I need to read it again. So touching, honest and well written.

Very Moving thoughtful meditation on tragedy and grief.

Wise. How much sorrow can a person endure? This author is a gift to all who struggle with sorrow. Grief does not go away. It just is.

Her deep and beautiful descriptions of sorrow

The concise and descriptive sentences that filled me with wonder and sadness. Such a remarkable author!!