On Apr 8, 2019, at 5:10 PM, John McCreery <john.mccreery@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
A Google search for “the ask” produces a rich body of data from which I infer
that “the ask” is frequently used in discussions of sales and/or
fundraising, denoting the point in the conversation at which the critical
question appears, will the target buy the offer.
One link is to a novel in which our friend David Richie might be particularly
interested.
The Ask
by Sam Lipsyte <https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/2282.Sam_Lipsyte>
(Goodreads Author)
3.28 · Rating details
<https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6698001-the-ask#> · 6,248 ratings
<https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6698001-the-ask#other_reviews> · 937
reviews <https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6698001-the-ask#other_reviews>
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 donor—a major “ask”—who, mysteriously,
has requested Milo’s involvement. But it turns out that the ask is Milo’s
sinister college classmate Purdy Stuart. And the “give” won’t come cheap.
Probing many themes— or, perhaps, anxieties—including work, war, sex, class,
child rearing, romantic comedies, Benjamin Franklin, cooking shows on death
row, and the eroticization of chicken wire, The Ask is a burst of genius by a
young American master who has already demonstrated that the truly provocative
and important fictions are often the funniest ones.
