All I Have in This World

“Springsteenian ode to the promise and heartbreak of the highway . . . Told with . . . emotional complexity and subtlety.” B>The New York Times

“This is a very funny, very moving novel about being lost and then found, about that rarest gift--shared sensibility--and about being saved . . . I love this book.” —Antonya Nelson, author of Bound

“Parker's skillfully rendered story rolls like a restless, unpredictable west Texas river--calm depths here, turbulent shallows there--as Marcus and Maria communicate (sometimes with words, sometimes with silence, almost always in the car) and lurch toward an imperfect union. This makes Parker's story remarkable. But what makes All I Have in This World memorable is this: While any number of disasters can (and do) take place along the way, and while some are heartbreaking, the watershed moments happen not with sadness or blood or pain, but with cascades of laughter. It's through moments of unabashed humor, when Marcus and Maria let go and laugh, that his characters finally, and completely, connect. Which feels a lot like real life.” I>TheDenver Post

“Don’t pass by Michael Parker’s book about a 'low-slung sky-blue 1984 Buick Electra' without kicking its tires, so to speak--it’s no lemon but a sweet, sinuous, and smart love story.” I>Washingtonian magazine’s blog

“The writing is direct, the characters vivid . . . In All I Have in This World, Parker, in prose clear as the Texas summer sky, gives us a portrait of two people who have tried their best to find themselves by running, literally from home or mentally from logic and good sense. Long may that Electra run.” I>Austin American-Statesman

“Parker deftly captures his characters’ uncertainties and hesitations as they struggle to move away from regret and toward the absolution they so desire.” I>Booklist

“Parker is an assured and emotionally sensitive writer.”