All I Ask

Like Sally Rooney’s Conversations with Friends and Eileen Myles’s Chelsea Girls, All I Ask by the award-winning and highly acclaimed author Eva Crocker is a defining novel of a generation. A little before seven in the morning, Stacey wakes to the police pounding on her door. They search her home and seize her computer and her phone, telling her they’re looking for “illegal digital material.” Left to unravel what’s happened, Stacey must find a way to take back the privacy and freedom she feels she has lost. Luckily, she has her friends. Smart and tough and almost terrifyingly open, Stacey and her circle are uncommonly free of biases and boundaries, but this incident reveals how they are still susceptible to society’s traps. Navigating her way through friendship, love, and sex, Stacey strives to restore her self-confidence and to actualize the most authentic way to live her life — one that acknowledges both her power and her vulnerability, her joy and her fear. All I Ask is a bold and bracing exploration of what it’s like to be young in a time when everything and nothing seems possible. With a playwright’s ear for dialogue and a wry, delicate confidence, Eva Crocker writes with a compassionate but unsentimental eye on human nature that perfectly captures the pitfalls of relying on the people you love.

Fans of Christina Lauren, Colleen Hoover, and Jill Santopolo will love this breathtaking story about first love, second chances, and starting over from New York Times bestselling author Corinne Michaels. Teagan Berkeley is trying her best. A single mom raising a precocious teen, she may have given up on her dreams, but she's accepted her life in her small beachside hometown. Now the one person who abandoned her when she needed him the most has returned, bringing back memories of what might have been. Derek Hartz arrives in town with a teenage daughter-and he's full of guilt over his failed marriage and the way he ended his friendship with Teagan. He's determined to set things right with her, but first he needs to gain her trust, something he's not convinced he deserves. As Teagan and Derek open up to each other-and confess their deepest secrets-it's impossible for them to deny what's always been between them. But just when their happily ever after is within reach, their complicated history surfaces again and threatens to keep them apart. Forever.

Fans of Christina Lauren, Colleen Hoover, and Jill Santopolo will love this breathtaking story about first love, second chances, and starting over from New York Times bestselling author Corinne Michaels. Teagan Berkeley is trying her best. A single mom raising a precocious teen, she may have given up on her dreams, but she's accepted her life in her small beachside hometown. Now the one person who abandoned her when she needed him the most has returned, bringing back memories of what might have been. Derek Hartz arrives in town with a teenage daughter-and he's full of guilt over his failed marriage and the way he ended his friendship with Teagan. He's determined to set things right with her, but first he needs to gain her trust, something he's not convinced he deserves. As Teagan and Derek open up to each other-and confess their deepest secrets-it's impossible for them to deny what's always been between them. But just when their happily ever after is within reach, their complicated history surfaces again and threatens to keep them apart. Forever.

From the Afterword by Franklin S. Odo: The most important feature of Milton Murayama's brilliant All I Asking for Is My Body is the quality of the storytelling. It deserves thorough discussion and criticism among literary professionals and students. The work has a further genius, however, in its evocation of several major topics in modern Hawaiian history, specifically during the 1930s, the decade before United States involvement in World War II. I suggest that Murayama’s novel provides us with valuable insights into the worlds of language, sugar plantation history, and the second-generation Japanese Americans, the nisei. . . . Critic Rob Wilson noted: “Part of the accomplishment of the novel is that the language ranges from the vernacular to the literate and standard, and so reflects the cultural and linguistic diversity of Hawaii.” In the novel, Murayama uses standard English and pidgin. In real life, the narrator Kiyo explains, “we spoke four languages: good English in school, pidgin English among ourselves, good or pidgin Japanese to our parents and the other old folks.” The wonder is that Murayama emerged using any one of the languages well. For most, that experience proved to be an insuperable barrier to good creative writing. . . . All I Asking for Is My Body is the most compelling work done on the Hawaii nisei experience. Murayama understood his theme to be “the Japanese family system vs. individualism, the plantation system vs. individualism. And so the environments of the family and the plantation are inseparable from the theme.” Fortunately for us as readers, however, he understood that the story was the key ingredient; that anything less would simply add to the sociological study of the plantation and the Japanese family in Hawaii.

They served their country, now these National Guardsmen will find their Happily Ever Afters. Fall in love with All I Ask, the first sizzling standalone romance in Nicole McLaughlin's Man Enough series. Staff Sergeant Reeve Miller lives by his own golden rules: Train hard, Work hard, and f*ck hard. This way of thinking has served him well. He’s enjoyed a successful career in the military, started his own landscaping business while serving part time in the Guard, and left a string of very happy females in his wake... until he meets one feisty, smart woman in a bar looking for a one-night stand. Emily Phillips is tired of working her ass off and not enjoying her life. According to her accountant, Emily is a millionaire. But her friends say she is a workaholic heading for lonely spinsterhood.The night of her high school best friend’s bachelorette party seems like a good time to try something new, and when the blue-collar hottie at the bar gives her the look, she’s ready to take a walk on the wild side. He makes it clear that he can give her a night to keep her very satisfied, and since it’s only a night, why bother sharing her title of CEO? But as one night becomes two and three, both Reeve and Emily find it harder to keep their hearts safe. "A super sexy, naughty-alpha-but-sweet hero, a boss-employee relationship with a twist... Nicole McLaughlin had a new fan by chapter two!" -- New York Times bestseller Erin Nicholas

From Lynn Kurland, the New York Times bestselling author of the Nine Kingdom series. Set near the Scottish border at a rugged castle on the edge of the sea, this is the story of a courageous lord who lost everything he held dear. Of a strong young woman willing to sacrifice everything for happiness. Two lost souls who find in each other a reason to live again, to laugh again, and to love for the first time...

A talented and ambitious chef, Jaime Martinez knows the value of hard work. Now the executive chef at his best friend’s vineyard in Heron’s Landing, Jaime only wants to make his mark on the culinary world. Romance? Not in the cards for him. And definitely not with his best friend’s little sister, who’s recently grown into a beautiful young woman. A painter and an innocent, Grace Danvers is a temptation that would only end in disaster. Yet when Grace confesses her feelings for Jaime one night, he’s suddenly torn between his attraction to her and his loyalty to her brother. Soon that loyalty is tested when Jaime comes under scrutiny for a crime he didn’t commit, a crime that could jeopardize all of his hard work and his blossoming romance with Grace. As things heat to a boiling point between the forbidden lovers, Jaime must now decide if he’s willing to sacrifice everything for the woman he loves. This title was previously published as Tempt Me Tenderly. It’s been rereleased with a brand-new look and with lightly edited content.

From the creator of the popular website Ask a Manager and New York’s work-advice columnist comes a witty, practical guide to 200 difficult professional conversations—featuring all-new advice! There’s a reason Alison Green has been called “the Dear Abby of the work world.” Ten years as a workplace-advice columnist have taught her that people avoid awkward conversations in the office because they simply don’t know what to say. Thankfully, Green does—and in this incredibly helpful book, she tackles the tough discussions you may need to have during your career. You’ll learn what to say when • coworkers push their work on you—then take credit for it • you accidentally trash-talk someone in an email then hit “reply all” • you’re being micromanaged—or not being managed at all • you catch a colleague in a lie • your boss seems unhappy with your work • your cubemate’s loud speakerphone is making you homicidal • you got drunk at the holiday party Praise for Ask a Manager “A must-read for anyone who works . . . [Alison Green’s] advice boils down to the idea that you should be professional (even when others are not) and that communicating in a straightforward manner with candor and kindness will get you far, no matter where you work.”—Booklist (starred review) “The author’s friendly, warm, no-nonsense writing is a pleasure to read, and her advice can be widely applied to relationships in all areas of readers’ lives. Ideal for anyone new to the job market or new to management, or anyone hoping to improve their work experience.”—Library Journal (starred review) “I am a huge fan of Alison Green’s Ask a Manager column. This book is even better. It teaches us how to deal with many of the most vexing big and little problems in our workplaces—and to do so with grace, confidence, and a sense of humor.”—Robert Sutton, Stanford professor and author of The No Asshole Rule and The Asshole Survival Guide “Ask a Manager is the ultimate playbook for navigating the traditional workforce in a diplomatic but firm way.”—Erin Lowry, author of Broke Millennial: Stop Scraping By and Get Your Financial Life Together