I’d like to thank everyone who offered me support and friendship while I was writing this novel, whether because they knew what I was doing or because they simply accepted that I did things like lock myself up alone in a room for hours at a time and this was probably normal. This gratitude especially extends to my family and my college housemates, Margaret, Lorraine, Jack, Kaitlin, and Fiona, who have a much-appreciated and very healthy respect for my shut door.
Thanks to everyone who helped me in the creation of the book: my sisters and my parents, especially my mother, who taught me so much about writing; Ryan, Shanelle, and Naomi, who let me talk at them about what fresh terrible things I was going to do to imaginary people; Sarah, who is smart and talented and absolutely not standing behind me with a gun to my head as I type this; my agent, Hannah; and my editor, Tricia.
Thanks also to the professor of my thermodynamics class in sophomore year. Without the confusion and crippling existential despair I felt during this class, Ananke would not exist. (Which is to say, professor, that I enjoyed your class a lot.)
And lastly, I’d like to extend my sincere thanks to the government organizations monitoring my Internet usage for not arresting me for extensively Googling “how many nuclear bombs would it take to make the Earth uninhabitable,” “death by cut throat,” and “psychology of early childhood development” all in one very ambitious afternoon.