I’d be remiss if I didn’t thank the various and sundry maniacs who helped bring this book to fruition. We have to start with my humanities and aesthetics professors at Centre College. I’m finally making something out of my liberal arts education with The Red and The Rose.
I also have to thank Mr. Bulfinch wherever he is for his fine compendium known commonly as Bulfinch’s Mythology. Also, I extend my gratitude to authors Catherine Johns (Sex or Symbol? Erotic Images of Greece and Rome), Robert Garland (Ancient Greece: Everyday Life in the Birthplace of Modern Civilization) and, of course, Homer (The Odyssey, The Iliad). Homer, the world owes you a donut. Sorry. I bet you hate that joke.
Massive piles of gratitude to freelance editor Mala Bhattacharjee for her brilliant suggestions and eagle-eyed editing. I can’t recommend her services to other authors enough!
Very special thanks to author Kira A. Gold (The Dirty Secret) for her astute editorial suggestions and costume corrections. Thank you, Jenn LeBlanc (The Rake and the Recluse), for help with English titles. I probably still got them wrong. Silly American.
Thank you, British comedian, author and TV presenter David Mitchell (Back Story, That Mitchell and Webb Look), for his entire oeuvre, which I devoured while writing The Rose in order to better reproduce the voice of a posh and whimsical (and adorably stuffy) English person.
Enormous thanks and love to the Eagle Creek Writers Group of Lexington, Kentucky, and our fearless leader, Jennifer Barricklow, for the constant encouragement and helpful critique. Much philia (“brotherly love”) to Earl P. Dean, Andrew J. Cole, Bob McKinley, Banning Lary and K. F. Lee, and all my other Eagle Creek writing buddies!
Thank you to the Carnegie Center for Literacy & Learning in Lexington, Kentucky, for the opportunity to teach creative writing. The more I teach, the more I learn.
Of course, great thanks is due to Michelle Meade, my fearless editor who was especially fearless when letting me loose on another erotica project. Eternal gratitude as always to my literary agent, Sara Megibow. Kudos to the cover designers at MIRA Books for my beautiful cover. It’s better than I dreamed.
Many kisses to everyone who read The Red and loved it enough to demand another adventure of those wicked Godwicks. Shall we go for three?
Of course I must thank the ancient peoples of Greece for the richness and beauty of their stories, myths, culture and legends. Now I raise a cup of wine to you and drink deep in your honor. Dii propitii! May the gods be propitious!
And finally, agape (“unconditional love”) and eros (“passionate love”) to my husband and fellow author, Andrew Shaffer (Hope Never Dies). Cupid got me good when I met you.
I mean, Eros.