I love the acknowledgement section of a book. It always feels like such a special glimpse into the real emotional hinterland of the author, more informal than the rigour of the pages before it.
Sorry if this disappoints.
To my mum, Deb, thank you as ever for your irrepressible curiosity and love. You taught us how to see the world. Lauryn, the funniest of us, you make me laugh every day. And Toby, who still finds it within himself to be excited for these books I am sure he has not read; I love that.
My dear Bridie, your no-nonsense friendship and careful input into parts of this book both terrify and sustain me. For the rest of the Jabour family, especially Chris who loaned me his riverside home and desk with frog statue for some writing inspiration, I love you all. And Philomena, thank you for allowing me to furiously type at your gorgeous place as well. Grafton is my second home, as you know. Poor Matt deserves some form of national recognition.
There is Candice, with whom I once plotted a publishing empire based on the as-yet unrealised Wish You Were Queer series, I adore you and your dad-joke ministry. And Mon, for how happy she makes you. To the rest of our crew: style icon Georgia Waters, mood icon Sabina Husic, Russian icon Nick Martin. How lucky I am.
My band of Lost Boys – Perry, Tom and Mick – have made the process of this book a dream from start to finish. Fate has a habit of intervening for the best, sometimes. Perry, I am glad it sent us both to a strange by-election for Barnaby Joyce in Tamworth for it was there that I found your friendship. And to your sister, Liv, I long to be as bright and joyous. To Tom, I’m glad Perth spat you out. Thank you for persevering through my bi-weekly meltdowns and your mastery of the meme. And Mick, for making my own coping mechanisms look elegant in comparison. We love you.
There are scores of others, of course. A whole flotilla of extraordinary people who keep me afloat. Dan Nolan and Emily Mulligan, Sam Leckie, Michael Roddan, Anthony Galloway and Christine and Miles. Those included here are as likely to lift me up as they are to absolutely ruin me with a devastating putdown, but that is the bargain we have all struck in such close friendship.
Eric George, my brilliant and amusing buddy, thank you for being a sounding board on all manner of things ridiculous, serious or frequently both at the same time. Shannon Molloy, your star continues to shine.
Mitchell Bingemann, for featuring in the intellectual and comical development of my life, I am indebted. I also have two of your books still and a dead succulent.
My pal Sammy Cochrane has done it again; hanging in there for another year on the Rick train of anxiety and self-deprecation. I don’t know how you do it, though I am glad that you do.
Emily Ritchie, for finishing the dinner when the phone rang. And for your bright-eyed candour. For Matthew Shaw, thank you. Your services in access to research have made this project infinitely easier.
To the Stained Daisies, my Kilby crew and all who have joined the ever-growing crowd of those sensations, what an honour to be among it. To Ben Caruso, for encouraging me down to Melbourne on a whim, you are a treasure. My colleagues at the Saturday Paper who put up with me while juggling this book and my work commitments are to be commended, especially during the final weeks of 2020 when all the disparate threads of the year became knotted.
And to the charming team at the Story Tree Cafe in Boonah, where I (finally) finished writing and editing this book. Your coffee and warmth kept me going.
There would be no book without the encouragement and insight of my publisher, Catherine Milne, who first asked me to explain the concept while I was slightly tipsy at Byron Bay. I didn’t know then how committed you would become, or how soothing, when I experienced my five or so crises of confidence. To James, for backing Catherine in when the acquisition became a contest, and Alice Wood who has already done so much to champion this project. I’m excited for what comes next.
To my agent, Jeanne Ryckmans, for accomplishing what I thought to be impossible and making me feel sick with wonder at the same time. Your know-how has changed my life. And, with emphasis, gratitude for my editors Maddy James and Lu Sierra. I have been rescued from myself by editors countless times throughout my career. There are no good writers without editors. No point in writing without them. Thank you, so much, for taking the poor soil of this manuscript and turning it into a garden. Maddy, especially, will be long remembered for a sadly now deleted intervention regarding the origins and meaning of the song ‘Who Let The Dogs Out’.
Through this whole project I have learned only slightly more about myself as I have about that song and I would not have it any other way.
To the HarperCollins design team for the gorgeous cover of this work, I have been unable to stop staring at it. It’s perfect.
My life has been sprinkled with the saving grace of amazing teachers, mentors and friends who have helped shape and form me through adversity. The list is long and growing still, but to each of them who I met at the precise right moments, a truly felt thank you. I hesitate to imagine where I would have ended were it not for your presence at a thousand points of potentially critical failure.
To all of the readers who have been with me since One Hundred Years of Dirt for the incredible, enduring reaction to that personal book. In this I have seen, and been able to clarify in my own thinking, the yearning for freedom from pain and hurt that can come through vulnerability. It has been, for me, a turning point.
At last, to Hamish and now Cormac. The new generation, whose inquiring minds are surrounded with love, the way I wish it were for all children. You have both expanded my heart.