My first thanks go to the beautiful city of Melbourne and the lovely country of Australia, my home for four and a half years. You’re not perfect, but when you’re great, you’re amazing. I wish you a much better future than the one imagined here.
I’d like to thank my incredible editors, Susannah Chambers, Alvina Ling, Eva Mills, and Bethany Strout, for all their assistance, especially when the deadline loomed and I had the absolutely genius idea to replace forty percent of the plot with “something else, I promise it’ll be really cool.” Thanks also to the Little, Brown crew for many things, including beignets and karaoke, and the Allen and Unwin crew for many things, including gossip and Friday-night drinks.
I started listing the names of the awesome people who made me welcome in Australia, and then I went on for two paragraphs, so I’ll just say: You know who you are, and thank you all. For material assistance, hand-holding and cluebat-wielding beyond the call of friendship, I want to thank Robyn, Carla, Melanie, Willow, Avery, Deb, Tessa, Tracey, Keith, Gina, and the Shame-In ladies. My particular thanks to Sefakor Dokli, Willow, Guria King, and Chally Kacelnik for their comments on this multicultural cast of characters—all remaining errors are mine alone. Barry Goldblatt is an excellent man, and a good host, and a great agent.
Finally, I would like to thank the Beatles, and especially Ringo Starr, who has always been my favorite and is the source of that thing I have for drummers.