Who Wants to Live Forever

by Hanna Thomas Uose

Genres: Literary Fiction; Dystopian

Synopsis

A GOOD HOUSEKEEPING GOOD BOOKS SPRING COLLECTION PICK

'I LOVED this addictive, beautifully written novel about romance, life and immortality.'
DAILY MAIL

'Bleak yet hopeful, romantic yet lonely, this novel is both ordinary and extraordinary.'
GLAMOUR

'I loved it so much I wanted it to go on forever'
FERN BRADY

'A timeless romance and a bold, inventive novel'
ELA LEE

'Dazzling: a cold hard reckoning with reality; a constantly surprising fear of imagination, philosophy, humanity, warmth and love'
JESSICA STANLEY

'This is a must-read book for 2025, especially for fans of Gabrielle Zevin'
JULIANNE PACHICO

This is the greatest romance you will ever read without the happily ever after.

Yuki and Sam are soulmates.
They are destined to spend the rest of their lives together.
They are supposed to love one another, forever.

But when a miracle drug is released which can extend a human's life indefinitely, Sam chooses to live forever, instead of loving Yuki forever - and the world they know is spun inside out.

WHO WANTS TO LIVE FOREVER plunges into a parallel universe where forever is on sale to the highest bidder. What comes next is a world-building epic narrated by an intersecting cast of characters that will drive you to the edge of reality and leave you to answer biggest questions of all: What is life without death? What is life without love?

Release date: March 27, 2025

Publisher: Octopus

Print pages: 320

Sample

Sam’s voice floated down from the loft. ‘Hello!’

Yuki smiled as she peeled off her raincoat, slipped off her boots and went to stand at the bottom of the ladder. ‘Hello!’ she called back.

‘And? What do you say?’

She took a deep breath and, tucking in her chin, dropped her voice an octave. ‘My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father.’

‘Correct. Prepare to die.’ And then the sound of his loud, satisfied laugh.

Comforted by their shared silliness, she grabbed a couple of leftover leaflets from her satchel and shoved them in the back of her jeans, before climbing up the wooden ladder and poking her head through the hatch.

Her husband worked at his desk, back turned. A shelf above him held holiday trinkets, an altar-like collection of pebbles and postcards. Another treasure trove sat in the corner, tucked below the slopes of the eaves – Sam’s guitars and pedals. He refused to admit that he’d claimed the loft as a ‘man cave’, but that was how Yuki referred to it to anyone who wasn’t him.

She shuffled over the floorboards, leaned down and wrapped her arms round his neck. Clean and woody. Her lips met his cheek and he reciprocated by nudging his head closer and puckering his mouth to kiss the air. Three mugs sat in a cluster near his right hand, the insides ringed brown. They had a tendency to replicate.

‘Cold cheeks! How long were you out there?’ Sam’s voice was warm, but his eyes darted back to the screen. Transport for London had commissioned him to design a series of posters. The browser window displayed the brief, although there were at least ten tabs open to Facebook, Reddit and God knew what else. On his second monitor, Photoshop gently pleaded: Let’s start something new. Start with your own document settings or from a range of document presets to get working quickly.

Her palms rested on his shoulders, solid as sun-warmed stone and clothed in the scratchy moss of his jumper. ‘Forever. How’s it going?’

She felt him tense up.

‘Just, you know, mulling over my approach with this job.’

Asking Sam anything about his work made him feel targeted. He’d told her that enough times, but what else was she meant to say?

She unsheathed the leaflets from her back pocket, a weapon of distraction. ‘I handed hundreds of them out.’ The post-box-red lettering was sharp and clear:

The bright teal of the Yareta logo gleamed. She’d roped Sam in to design them as a favour.

‘Thank you again, sweetheart. Everyone really appreciated it,’ she said.

He took one and flipped it over, brows drawing close together. ‘Ah, they’re on the wrong paper stock. And the colours are off register.’

‘Well, the budget was quite small.’

‘Sorry.’ He handed the leaflet back. ‘Tiny things. I’m sure you won over the masses.’

‘Hardly.’ She shrugged.

The afternoon had been a wash-out, literally and figuratively. She and Greg, a union organiser, had manned the Stop Yareta stall outside Peckham Rye station all afternoon and didn’t have even a hundred signatures to show for it. Most passers-by let their leaflets waft to the tarmac – her walk home had been littered with a rot of recycled paper and sycamore leaves.

‘Well then, we’ll have to get used to living under the thumb of our eternal overlords,’ Sam said. There was a lightness in his voice.

She picked at the skin on her lip. ‘Hopefully it doesn’t come to that.’

His apathy was something else, his assumption that all politicians and all policies were the same. They rarely talked about the content of the press releases she churned out each day from the cramped little office of their local MP. He preferred to hear the daily gossip and give her co-workers alliterative nicknames. Sam was more of a do-gooder than she was, so idealistic that he couldn’t bring himself to look too closely at the world. She turned to head back down.

He swivelled in his chair. ‘We okay?’ He held out his hand and she clasped it, reassured.

‘Course.’ She smiled. ‘I’m going to heat up some soup. Want to watch Grand Designs in a bit? Who knows, the couple might even stay together this time.’

He whistled through his teeth and looked askance, as if weighing up his options. ‘I think I’d better crack on. It might be a late one. Is that okay?’

She nodded, valiantly. ‘I’ll just veg out with abandon, then.’

‘That’s my girl.’

She was proud she hadn’t betrayed her irritation, even though she assumed she’d soon hear the plucked twang of his guitar. He closed down his multiple browser tabs and made a show of rolling up his sleeves.

The soup had a metallic flavour, like IVF, or, at least, the ever-present aftertaste that had followed her through two failed cycles. There was no need to relive all that. It was time to accept that even though she’d mapped it all out – a wedding, then one or two kids by thirty-five – that wasn’t how life worked. She and Sam would have to content themselves with walking an unbroken path across a flat land. No more signposts. At least, that’s what The Power of Patience and Surrender seemed to say, the self-help book that told her to trust in divine timing. Its sentiment was a comfort until Yuki thought of her mum. She grimaced and poured the thick soup down the plughole.

How would she and Sam spend their time, without a child to care for? Yuki was happy to spend her love freely, but on whom exactly? In what community did they belong? Slowly, their friends and their kids were leaving London or, like Becca and Caro, defecting north of the river. Perhaps it was time for them to leave too, to move to the coast and finally settle their longstanding dispute about which was superior: cockapoos or whippets. Yuki would probably give in, and that was all right.

She settled on the sofa with a plate of apple quarters and chocolate Pocky sticks, ready for Grand Designs. The ladder creaked over the jingle of the opening credits – Sam was clambering down. Nestling in beside her, he slung his arm round her shoulder and kissed her temple.

‘I changed my mind.’

‘I was starting to suspect you were a party pooper.’

‘Me? Never.’ He opened his mouth wide. ‘Hit me.’

She placed a stick of Pocky on his tongue. He crunched it happily.

The green room was cramped and airless, the fluorescent lights glaring directly into Yuki’s eyes. At 5:30am, she was already on her second instant coffee.

‘Okay – one last time – our three key messages?’ she asked Fiona. They faced each other on the cream leather couch under a cheery orange sign that read Good Morning Britain. Yuki was in her uniform of jeans, shirt and loafers, her hair just grazing her chin. Fiona wore her red ‘telly’ dress and a heavily made-up face.

‘Right. Yes. Number one – guinea pigs. Two – the NHS will suffer, and inequality, etc. Three.’ Her eyes widened. ‘Fuck. I know this. It’ll come to me.’

Yuki laughed despite the nerves gripping her stomach. ‘You do know this. It’s just very early.’

‘Undermines democracy and human rights! Three.’ Fiona smiled. ‘I need an espresso.’

‘Don’t worry. You’ll smash this,’ Yuki said. She hoped that saying it would make it true.

The primetime slot was a big win for the campaign, and evidence of Yuki’s press outreach. Finally, her volunteer hours had paid off; Greg had given her an appreciative nod the day before when he sent her off home. Yuki was grateful for both him and Fiona – people with a keen sense of justice who bolstered her conviction when it faltered and gave her the reassuring feeling that life had a manual.

The door swung open and – as if she were hallucinating – Frank Walker, founder of WalkOn and creator of Yareta, stepped in. Yuki hadn’t imagined that he would deign to visit the green room. Surely he had his own private dressing room full of probiotics, massage therapists and cold-pressed juices? But here he was, picking an overripe banana from the fruit bowl on the kitchen counter and eating it with gusto. How could this be real? He appeared just like he did online – at seventy-three, he looked forty, a good forty too. Thick, wavy hair. Tanned skin. Bleached teeth. A slim-fitting shirt that suggested a light musculature underneath. He screamed American.

Yuki couldn’t help but stare. Fiona studiously avoided eye contact until Frank approached and – incomprehensibly – shook each of their hands.

‘Fiona. Yuki,’ he said with two nods and a wide smile. ‘It’s a pleasure to meet you.’

Fear seized her. How did he know who she was? Stop Yareta was a small, volunteer-led operation. But of course – she chided herself – WalkOn had the resources to do their research.

He tossed the banana peel into the rubbish bin with a flourish, threw them a wink and left.

‘What a cock,’ Fiona said under her breath.

*

The studio was stifling and the overhead lights dazzled with heat. The ON AIR sign flashed red as the blue studio ticker ran across the wall with the day’s headlines. The only sound was the Glaswegian brogue of the weather presenter who gesticulated in front of a green screen.

To the right, the presenter, Matthew Price, sat on an L-shaped couch with a faux wood window frame behind him, displaying an LED view of St Paul’s. He whispered quietly with Frank, who sat opposite. Fiona was sitting next to Frank and didn’t look too nervous. Yuki tried to catch her friend’s eye, but she was clearly deep in mental preparation.

Yuki was standing behind a wall of seven cameras, watching as a bald man all in black, CREW stamped on his shirt in white letters, operated the one nearest. On his monitor, she saw Frank and Matthew share a silent, knowing chuckle.

What if she screamed ‘Stop Yareta!’ just once? What if she ran towards the cameras, stripped off her clothes and repeated the words entirely naked? What if she took Frank hostage just like that little girl, Gina, had been taken in Nebraska? What then?

Tempting as it was, she had never displayed her madness for others to see. So, no. Instead, she remained perfectly silent and still as the weather presenter signed off with a well-worn catch phrase.

‘Who wants to live forever?’ Matthew Price suddenly bellowed to camera, his face flushed red and his tie too tight. ‘That’s what we’re talking about today on Good Morning Britain, since the life-extending drug, Yareta, might finally be available in the UK after the upcoming referendum. We welcome Frank Walker back to the show, CEO of WalkOn and the man behind the medicine, and Fiona McCord, speaking on behalf of the campaign group, Stop Yareta.’

The cameraman pulled back. The weather presenter, finally out of shot, slumped against the wall and began to examine his cuticles.

Matthew continued. ‘Frank, you’ve enjoyed a lot of success in the last few years. CEOs, celebrities – some of whom you’ve dated – and, allegedly, even a few of our royals are fans of Yareta. An estimated two per cent of the US population is on it, and that’s projected to soar above ten per cent in the next decade. How does it feel to have found the key to immortality?’

Frank chuckled. ‘Well, I have to correct you there, Matthew. I’m extremely proud of what we’ve achieved, but we can’t claim that Yareta makes anyone immortal. Our evidence points to lifespans of two to three hundred years, but’ – he offered a lopsided smile – ‘we’ll just have to see what happens.’

‘See what happens?’ Matthew performed horror. ‘The public needs more than that to go on, Frank.’

‘All right. Well, the average lifespan of a domestic mouse is around two to four years, but in our labs our mice are in fine health for up to fourteen years when on Yareta. If we extrapolate that data, it suggests we’re looking at human lifespans of around 280 years, but we can’t be sure – not until 2275, anyway. That’s not unusual – the scientific method is all about observation and experimentation.’

Matthew raised his eyebrows. ‘You want to experiment with my body, Frank? Oh dear!’ The camera zoomed in as he pulled a pantomime grimace.

Frank smiled and relaxed into the couch. ‘Sure. Take a look at the products in your medicine cabinet: paracetamol, penicillin. We don’t know how they work, just that they do.’

Matthew turned. ‘It’s a bit unsettling, isn’t it, Fiona? Still, Yareta might soon be available over the counter. How do you feel about that?’ Matthew pointed his finger at her. Yuki’s breath caught in her throat.

‘It’s a total circus, Matthew. A tiny proportion of the American public has been experimenting with Yareta for less than twenty years – we have no idea of the long-term effects, since it’s almost entirely untested outside of small clinical trials. It’s crucial that people watching at home understand that to take this drug – at enormous cost, by the way – is to be Frank Walker’s guinea pig.’

Frank slowly shook his head.

‘Secondly,’ Fiona continued, ‘it’s the elite who take Yareta in the States, and it will be exactly the same story here. They are the only ones who can afford it, who can afford to divest from the NHS, which – by the way – is projected to lose thousands more doctors and nurses to private practice when there are already 100,000 vacancies. To vote yes in this referendum is to abandon the multi-ethnic working and middle class, who already experience the devastating impacts of health inequality under the current system.

‘And, thirdly, Yareta poses a dreadful risk to our democracy and human rights.’

Yuki clenched her fist in glee.

‘What will happen when our elected representatives can stand and stand again in their constituencies, holding on well past their sell-by date? What kinds of people want to be in a position of power for a hundred years or more? Yareta endangers democracy itself, not to mention human rights. Child permits for those on the drug will oblige the NHS to enact a Stasi-like surveillance of any expectant mother. These are situations that none of us want and yet, after many years of Mr Walker wining and dining and – let’s face it – bribing, we have a referendum on our hands.’ She turned towards Frank, her face all challenge. He didn’t attempt to counter.

‘What do you say to that, Frank?’ said Matthew. ‘To those who consider it a scandal that, in 2022, you were photographed at lunch with our prime minister at 5 Hertford Street in Mayfair, allegedly costing the taxpayer more than £5,000? Of course, you’re no stranger to controversy – there are the sad and ongoing consequences of counterfeit versions of the drug and, more recently, the tragic story of Gina Reece, who at twelve years old was coerced into taking Yareta while held in captivity by the predator Jerry Mayberry. There have even been rumours that you drink the blood of college students! What do you say to all that?’

‘Well, Matthew, all I can say is that I appreciate you holding off the garlic this morning.’

Yuki rolled her eyes. Unbelievable, how easy it was for people in power.

‘Here’s the thing, Matthew. Our company, WalkOn, meets with decision makers to ensure that Yareta will be regulated to the highest degree. My worst fear is that Yareta causes harm to the world, so it is right that we are held to a high standard by governments and that they set the terms. We want to be subject to tight controls, Matthew. We will respond to consumer demand around the world, of course, but only in a safe and responsible manner. The referendum is one step towards that. The sooner countries introduce legal avenues to obtain a Yareta prescription, the safer their people will be. And when it comes to Gina Reece – who I have met and spoken with at length – I must remind you that, as a result of her case, we recommend a legal minimum age of twenty-five in order to avoid awful situations like the one she endured at the hands of Jerry Mayberry.’

Oh, he was good.

‘And yet,’ Fiona interjected, ‘you also recommend an upper age limit of fifty and have lobbied to deny Yareta to anyone with pre-existing conditions. That’s a form of eugenics, isn’t it?’

Frank laughed at this. ‘My, that’s a strong word, Fiona. I’m not sure we want to go there this early in the morning.’

While Fiona was not wrong, she was not on message. In fact, ‘eugenics’ was one of the words that Yuki had clearly listed under the Don’t Say column in the Stop Yareta messaging guide. Fiona, realising her mistake, flushed.

Matthew jumped in. ‘Fiona, I can see what you’re getting at, but I want you to be honest. If you won the lottery tomorrow, wouldn’t you take Yareta?’

‘Absolutely not.’

‘Honestly? Truly?’ He wagged his finger again.

‘No.’ She paused, confused. ‘I mean, yes. Wait, no, I wouldn’t.’

‘You wouldn’t? You seem hesitant.’

Fiona was now the colour of her dress. ‘No.’

Yuki closed her eyes. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

Matthew Price droned on. ‘Now, Frank – how will Yareta’s increasing availability affect the Olympics?’

At 9:15am, Yuki stood outside the brick and glass of the television centre, waiting between two ornamental trees. She ordered the Uber, while Fiona changed and washed her tear-stained face.

Yuki looked up from the slow-moving cartoon car – nine minutes – to see Frank standing just half a metre away on the kerb, looking at her.

He lifted his chin. ‘How do you think that went?’

Yuki raised her eyebrows. ‘How do you think it went?’

‘It was fine,’ he said, taking a step towards her. ‘You Brits give me a hard time. But no hard feelings. On my side.’ He smiled, presenting the brilliant white of his teeth.

How strange that he was attempting to endear himself, instead of dealing with her as an adversary. Either he thought she was not worth his disdain – quite likely – or he really did want her to like him. This man, who could have anything, be anything, do anything. None of it was enough.

All at once, she saw the truth of him. A boy who had developed unevenly, who was hoarding time to fill some other void. Like a rich man focused on the next billion, instead of spending his current one wisely. Of course, he was that man as well.

‘I don’t know what your problem is, but what you’re doing is not the solution,’ she said.

He placed a hand on his chest, acting hurt. ‘Come on, now. I’m giving life – it can’t be all that bad.’

‘To a few,’ she said. ‘Only to those wealthy enough. The rest of us, you couldn’t give two shits about.’

‘That’s not true.’ He shook his head, seeming sad. ‘I can see why you think that, but it’s just not true. It’s like William Gibson said, “The future is unequally distributed.” It’ll find everyone eventually, even you.’

He shrugged, then picked up his silver carry-on as a black saloon car pulled up. This was her moment. Her one chance to say whatever she wanted to Frank Walker. Her heart jumped.

‘And death will find you eventually, Frank, whether it’s tomorrow or in two hundred years. You could have just gone to therapy to deal with your fear of it, you know, but instead you decided to upend the entire social order.’

‘Fear? No, you’ve got me wrong there. I don’t fear death.’ He slid on a pair of beetle-like sunglasses. ‘I just love life.’

Sam sat on an iron bench outside the local art gallery, his hands cupping hot coffee and a bran muffin. The adjoining café was playing Ed Sheeran, which was why he sat in the courtyard facing the road, trying to tune out the sentimental dross with the sound of traffic.

Yuki would usually walk him here, before heading on to work with purpose. It was nice to feel like they had the same start to the day, the same momentum. But after forty-five minutes he would walk home. Sometimes, he had a to-do list. More often, he fiddled about trying to make one. That morning, Yuki had left at 4:30am to help someone prep for a television interview – bright lights, big city – so he had moved through their routine alone. That is, after he had lain awake for three hours, running through all the wrong turns that had brought him to this point where at thirty-eight – two years from forty, came the looping thought – his dreams had diminished like a cone of melting ice cream.

If Yuki’s trajectory was a hockey-stick graph, his was a flat line. When she’d slipped out of bed in the dark, he was overcome with the urge to reach out and pull her backwards, knowing that every new development in her life inched a further distance between them. But he didn’t, obviously. Instead, he berated himself until it was time to shower. He did feel proud – so proud – that she had made a life of doing good in the world. But he didn’t watch the interview. He had buttoned up his jacket and made his way to this bench, only to be confronted with Joe Rawlins’s new show.

The banner threatened to flap away in the cold wind, only a cable-tie at each corner securing it to the gallery’s railings. Joe Rawlins: Euclidean Threads. The small print pronounced the show as a meditation on the fabric of space-time, using textiles that the artist had handwoven.

He shoved a few crumbs of muffin into his mouth, working them into a mealy paste. One of the pieces from Sam’s final degree show had sold for £400 and he had bought everyone a drink, including Joe. He was a good lad, sure, but who would have guessed that Joe would be the big success story? Sam’s website still featured the drawings he’d made at college: intricate, geometric things, line drawings of patterns upon patterns upon patterns. He used to get lost while making them, time falling away.

But Sam had wanted to pursue music instead, so dropped his artistic ambitions and deployed his illustration skills for cash – posters, labels, logos, whatever was going. Sometimes, he did a landscape-gardening job with his mate, Charlie, if work was slow to come in. Altogether, it wasn’t the life he had planned, but it was acceptable. At least, he was in a slow process of acceptance. Well, no, but he had begun to consider accepting it.

He put down his cup and pulled out the Moleskine and stubby yellow pencil from the front pocket of his jacket. Everything is copy, he thought. Resting the notebook on a crossed knee, he transformed his thoughts into leaden scratchings.

Vomit up the space-time fabric

Wearing retro spectacles

March it backwards with your muffin

Move it along now

He ruffled a hand through his hair, pleased. Wicked. Nadeem and Cal would love this. He took a picture and WhatsApped it to the group. It had been hard to get them all together over the last couple of years now that they had ‘dad duties’. Sam was convinced that Nad used his wife as an excuse to get out of rehearsal, because the last time they were all at the pub he’d asked her – only half joking – what she had against good music, and she had thrown him a puzzled look. When the band did meet, it was brilliant. They had played a couple of cover gigs in the early days, and hosted a few open jam sessions, but the next step was to record their own stuff. It was time to nail it down. He took a deep breath.

Shoving his grubby napkin into the now empty coffee cup, he stared at Joe’s banner again. He stood, walked round the railing and up the stone steps to the gallery entrance, a grand affair of red and white brick, bordered by Gothic columns of white stone. A gallery attendant stepped aside as Sam crossed the threshold.

The inside was a white box: tall, modern, blank. The air, by contrast, was embroidered with colourful threads that stretched from floor to ceiling, bending and shaping the space into a multitude of dark rainbows that glimmered in the light. A bookish couple in French workwear drifted through the space, whispering their admiration.

Sam waited to be moved, his eye dutifully following the curves. He ambled over to the artist’s statement and found it intentionally opaque. Maybe this was why Sam hadn’t found comparable success. He wasn’t in tune. Didn’t get it. Or maybe it was just a load of fucking thread.

He escaped back into the sunlight – it had turned into a brisk but bright day – and chanced it across the road between red double-deckers (Pantone 485 C), towards home.

Smug, Sam sent off a first draft of the TfL poster designs at 10:30am. Thirty minutes later, a request for a series of ‘small’ changes landed in his inbox, that required a completely different approach. I’ll turn it around asap, he promised, then changed into his running gear.

He bounced along the pavement, under the plane trees and past the wilting roses and browning hydrangeas that bowed over garden walls. Skin tingling with cold, he flew by the sort of stern women with tightly rolled yoga mats that Yuki felt inferior to (bollocks to that, he’d told her), and men in beanies trading opinions over takeaway cups. The bright green smell of the juice stand and the bloody stink of the butcher wafted together in the air. A sour taste gathered in his mouth, and he spat . . .