All I Ask

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 Askis 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. (FromHouse of Anansi Press)

All I Askwas onthe 2020 Scotiabank Giller Prize longlist.

Crocker is a novelist and short story writer from Newfoundland. Her first bookwas the short story collectionBarrelling Forward.CBC Books named Crocker a writer to watch in 2020.

• The CBC Books Writers to Watch 2020 list
• 60 works of Canadian fiction to watch for in fall 2020
• Eva Crocker wrote a coming-of-age story for uncertain times
• The CBC Books fall 2020 reading list
• How Muskrat Falls and a police incident inspired Eva Crocker's latest novel All I Ask

Why Eva Crocker wrote All I Ask

"Like Stacey in the novel, I had a similar incident happen to me.Agroup of police officers insisted on entering my house and began searching it.I didn't have an opportunity to change out of my pyjamas. I had to go to my bedroom alone with a man, which is disturbing for me.

"It turned out that they were investigating an incident that had happened months before I moved in. They didn't realize that there were new tenants in the house.In my case, the police didn't end up confiscating my electronics, but they would have if they didn't realize that I wasn't the suspect.

Like Stacey in the novel, I had a similar incident happen to me. A group of police officers insisted on entering my house and began searching it.- Eva Crocker

"The incident got me thinking about how much worse things might have gone for me if I wasn't white and cis-gendered, if English wasn't my first language, if I had a kid there with me or if I had a health condition or was elderly. It also made me think about privacy."

Read more from her interview with The Next Chapter.

Interviews with Eva Crocker

The Next Chapter11:49Eva Crocker on All I Ask

St. John's-based writer Eva Crocker shares the inspiration behind her debut novel All I Ask.

Other books by Eva Crocker