This book could not have been written without Rochelle Jewell Shapiro. She took time from writing her own novel to read endless drafts, and to comment and critique even the conjunctions. She calmed and cheered, she was the perfect critic and the perfect friend, and she cared about this book as much as she cared about me. Thank you, thank you, Rochelle.
For years I’ve seen the name Gail Hochman praised in acknowledgment after acknowledgment of my favorite books, and I’m so thrilled that now I get to do the same. I couldn’t ask for a smarter, funnier, warmer, and more completely wonderful agent, champion, and friend. My gratitude is boundless, my devotion absolute.
A multitude of deepest thanks to Jennifer Weis, Joanna Jacobs, and everyone at St. Martin’s Press.
My gratitude, too, for the support and kindness of Nancy Lattanzi, Lindy Judge, Jo Fisher, Jane Praeger, Linda Corcoran, Peter Salzano,
Andrea Valeria, Micky Pearlman, and Fatima Bayati; and for my mother, Helen Leavitt, my sister, Ruthy Rogers, and Hillary and Jonathan Rogers, too.
I’d also like to thank Dr. Steven Ordorica, Dr. Henrietta Lackner, Dr. Kenneth Hymes, Dr. Robert Wallach, Dr. Francis Adams, Dr. Steven Hoffstetter, Dr. Elliot Newman, Dr. Steven Rosen, and every single person at Mount Sinai-NYU Medical Center. I would also like to thank Dr. William Bell of Johns Hopkins.
More thanks and love than I can say to Jeff, who took infinite, loving care of me and this book both, who read every single night with thought and attention, even as his own book deadline loomed, and who lived these pages along with me.
And for Max Henry Leavitt Tamarkin, who’s the reward.