ACKNOWLEDGMENTS1

I’m indebted and thankful to too many people to name them all. But I’ll try my best here.

First: thank you to my parents for forcing me to go to Sunday school, where I learned the lasting power of stories. To my first writing instructors, Sydney Brown and Harold Jaffe, thank you for showing me how to read, for telling me to keep writing.

Next: to all my classmates in the San José State University MFA program, thank you for reading and grooming those early drafts. Kevin Manning and Amanda Moore, your time and care with showing me how to be a better writer. I couldn’t have asked for better friends. My thesis advisors, Susan Shillinglaw, Nick Taylor, and Cathleen Miller—your collective patience and guidance—thank you. Andrew Altschul, for calling out all the bullshit. And Daniel Alarcón for teaching me not to leave any “money on the table” where the story is concerned.

Then: a million thanks to Chad Post and Kaija Straumanis for making me feel welcome when I was new in town. Thank you for introducing me to other writers and artists. Sharon Rhodes for her keen eye and kindred spirit. Peter Conners for taking a chance on me, for seeing something in my work. Thank you Rodrigo Fresán for being a friend and mentor, a writer who continually makes me want to throw my hands up and cuss at the wall—in a good way.

Always: Katie. Forever and ever. Thank you for your unending support, for showing me what grit and hard work looks like. Thank you for giving me the courage to doggedly hound my dreams. I love you.

1 To be read frantically, with urgency, as if given at an awards ceremony and the conductor has begun playing the “will you please get off the stage now” music.