The Ask: A Novel

About this book

A searing beautiful and deeply comic novel by a young American master Milo Burke a development officer at a third-tier university has "not been developing": after a run-in with a well-connected undergrad he finds himself among the burgeoning class of the newly unemployed. Grasping after odd jobs to support his wife and child Milo is offered one last chance by his former employer: he must reel in a potential donora major "ask"who mysteriously has requested Milos involvement. But it turns out that the ask is Milos sinister college classmate Purdy Stuart. And the "give" wont come cheap. Probing many themes or perhaps anxietiesincluding work war sex class child rearing romantic comedies Benjamin Franklin cooking shows on death row and the eroticization of chicken wire Sam Lipsytes The Ask is a burst of genius by an author who has already demonstrated that the truly provocative and important fictions are often the funniest ones. A New York Times Book Review Editors Choice