I’m very grateful to all the kind friends who read early drafts and were either encouraging, or suggested improvements (in many cases significant), or both. Charlotte Robertson was particularly supportive at a crucial time, and through her I came to have Peter Straus as my agent. His faith in the book was inspiring and his editorial comments insightful. I am so pleased to have been taken up by Sarah and Kate Beal at Muswell Press and am looking forward to the adventure of publication with them. This has already included significant enhancements first (and crucially) in the structural edit by Laura McFarlane and then in the copyedit by Kate Quarry. As ever, my greatest thanks are to my wife, Amanda, both as a reader, and for everything else.