Every book is the product of a community, and I’m grateful to all the folks who have helped and supported me along the way.
First, to my agent Deidre Knight, who guided me through a cavalcade of edits with aplomb, and who answered my many, many questions and wonderings. I’m a far better writer than I was a year ago because of your encouragement and advice.
Stephanie Doig, Deborah Nemeth, Ronan Sadler, and the rest of the team at Carina Press for making this manuscript come to life and helping me navigate the wilds of publishing. Kudos in particular to Deb for helping me strip out approximately 10,000 dialogue tags. And thank you to John Kicksee for the lovely cover design.
Jon Reyes and Laura Brown, who read drafts of this manuscript and offered constructive and thoughtful feedback about the portrayal of certain characters, topics, and themes.
Harry Pavlidis, Jarrett Seidler, Jesse Dougherty, and the folks in Baseball-landia who were gracious with their time and attention. (And when I said, it’s, uh, for a romance novel, all went, “yes, and we want it to be accurate, right???”) Any remaining baseball mistakes are my own.
Mia Tsai, who, as a “pitching coach,” coached me through writing my first Twitter pitch, which would eventually shape the one for #CarinaPitch. Thank you for helping me understand stakes and raise them.
The lovely writers of the Romance Schmooze, whose daily conversations, musings, and thoughts about writing and Judaism are always a pleasure. I’ve learned so much from you all and feel reconnected to my Jewishness in ways I wasn’t expecting.
Mary Ocampo gets her own shoutout and possibly hazard pay for putting up with my grammatical choices for the past ten years.
The denizens of Nats Twitter, without whom my baseball fandom would be much, much poorer. Watching baseball is more fun with y’all whether at the ballpark or online. I promise I’ll try to work Baby Shark into a subsequent book.
The Bear-pen—Jett, Dara, and Noah—who are a constant source of queer Jewish baseball joy, and our Shabbos goy Kay, for providing pasta and opinions. You told me never to live a bullpen life, and I didn’t listen.
Nathalie Alonso, who has been the best publishing buddy anyone could want, and whose thoughts and input on baseball, writing, and the world I would be worse without. I am impatiently awaiting your many books.
Laura Shir: This book is for you. For naming Zach and Eugenio, and reading all of this a thousand times (and edits of edits and edits), and puzzling out difficult scenes and providing feedback every step of the way from inception to publication. You asked me to tell you a story—in a GChat!—and I guess I did. Thank you for holding my hand while I screamed and cried, and for doing it patiently. You are the finest book midwife in this and any galaxy.
My family (Mom & Dad, if you’re reading this, I told you not to!), including my sister, the world’s biggest Willie Harris fan (™). Teach Daniel to throw left-handed, please.
Sam, herder of cats, provider of tea and support, proofreader extraordinaire, fetcher of beers and food at the ballpark, who cares not for baseball but a lot for me: I love you. <3
And to you, the reader of this book. Thank you for coming on this journey.