A romantic, heartfelt, and hilarious queer coming-of-age story from All That's Left in the World author Erik J. Brown, perfect for fans of What If It’s Us and If This Gets Out.
Tommy Dees is in the weeds—restaurant speak for beyond overwhelmed. He’s been working as a server at Sunset Estates retirement community to get the experience he needs to attend one of the best culinary schools in the world. And to make his application shine, he also needs a letter of recommendation from his sadistic manager. But in exchange for the letter, Tommy has to meet three conditions—including training the new hire.
What he doesn’t expect is for the newbie to be an old crush: Gabe, with the dimples and kind heart, who Tommy fell for during summer camp at age eleven and then never saw again. Unfortunately, Gabe doesn’t remember Tommy at all. The training proves distracting as old feelings resurface and the universe seems to be conspiring against them.
With the application deadline looming and Gabe on his mind, Tommy is determined to keep it all together—but what if life isn’t meant to follow a recipe?
Erik J. Brown's debut novel, All That's Left in the World, was named a Junior Library Guild Selection and received a starred review from Kirkus Reviews. Erik was also selected as a Lambda Literary Emerging Writers Fellow. When not writing genre-blending books for young adults, he enjoys traveling and embarking on the relentless quest of appeasing his Shiba Inu. He lives in Philadelphia with his husband.