Ask Me Again

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From Clare Sestanovich, the PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize nominee whose short stories received instant acclaim, a debut novel about a young woman's coming of age, in parallel with a renegade male friend who challenges her beliefs and the course of her life. Eva meets Jamie by chance. She is sixteen, living in middle-class Brooklyn; he is the same age, but from the super-rich of upper Manhattan. She's observant, cautious, eager to seem normal; he's bold, mysterious, eccentric. Eva's family is warm and welcoming, but Jamie avoids going home to his. Despite having little in common, they instantly forge a deep friendship. As Eva goes off to college and falls in and out of love, Jamie drops out of school and is drawn toward radical experiments in politics and religion. Their separate spheres seem to be spiralling away from each other, but it soon becomes clear that they are both circling the same question: how do you define yourself and your beliefs in a divided and unjust world Written with precision and immense wit, Ask Me Again is a journey of intimacy across time. A love story of sorts, this coming-of-age novel explores how relationships can define us, change us and point us towards futures we might not have imagined for ourselves.

Reviews

Pulled along by the shimmering subtleties of Sestanovichs prose, we track our boy and girl into adulthood . . . a finely drawn portrait of the kind of friendship we rarely see in contemporary fiction -- Jonathan Lee, The Guardian
Sestanovichs allusive tone and incisive prose recall the best of Rooney -- Michael Arditti,Spectator
Ask Me Again is a beautifully observed and deeply philosophical novel, which surprises and delights at every turn -- Jenny Offill, author of Weather
Rigorous, intensely observed, and brimming with the sort of elusive revelations that form the heartbeat of a life, Sestanovichs novel debut demonstrates a tremendous gift at rendering the texture of love, faith, and heartbreak with both subtlety and force. In her masterful hands, relationships condense, turn acute, and unfurl with symphonic grace across the individual arcs of characters that you cant help but carry with you long afterward -- Alexandra Kleeman, author of Something New Under the Sun
Quietly revelatory . . . there is something of Sally Rooney in Ask Me Agains creation of intimacy through curiosity and gentle interrogation. Although here, refreshingly, rather than centring on connection, the narrative propulsion is towards making peace with being alone . . . an assured coming-of-age novel asks if we can truly know anyone but ourselves -- Miriam Balanescu, Financial Times
This beautiful debut novel is wise about intellectual and erotic discovery, disenchantment and loneliness. Its alert to the small moments of awkwardness and grace that make up the texture of common life; its quiet, tectonic power comes from an awareness of how easily common life can tilt toward catastrophe. Clare Sestanovich is a writer of disarming radiance -- Garth Greenwell, author of Cleanness
Sestanovich captivates with her distinctive characterizations . . . an intelligent exploration of lives in the making * Publishers Weekly *
Ask Me Again is both an impressive and sophisticated novel -- Lucy Thynne, The Daily Telegraph

Author Bio

Clare Sestanovich is the author of Objects of Desire, published by Picador, which was a finalist for the PEN Robert W. Bingham Prize. She was named a '5 Under 35' honoree by the National Book Foundation in 2022. Her fiction has appeared in The New Yorker, The Paris Review, Harper's, The Drift, and Electric Literature. She lives in Brooklyn.