THERE ARE SOME people, I imagine, who find writing easy. You know the sort – the ones who jump out of bed before sunrise, have a chapter written by lunch and forget to come down to dinner because they’re so at one with their creative flow that they just didn’t realize the time.
I am definitely not one of those people.
Getting through this process involved a daily battle with the side of my character that just wants to sit on the sofa eating crisps and watching Netflix, and an all-out war with the tsunamis of worry and panic that I thought I’d left behind when I finished my PhD. I didn’t really write this book so much as drag it out of myself, kicking and screaming. Sometimes literally.
So I’m all the more grateful to the remarkable group of people who were willing to help me along the way. My fantastic publishing team, who have been so generous with their time and ideas over the past year: Susanna Wadeson, Quynh Do, Claire Conrad, Emma Parry, Gillian Somerscales, Emma Burton, Sophie Christopher, Hannah Bright, Caroline Saine and all the people at Janklow and Nesbit, Transworld and Norton who have been helping behind the scenes. Likewise, Sue Rider, Kat Bee and Tom Copson. I’d be lost without you.
Enormous thanks, too, to my interviewees, some of whom are quoted in the text, but all of whom helped shape the ideas for the book: Jonathan Rowson, Nigel Harvey, Adam Benforado, Giles Newell, Richard Berk, Sheena Urwin, Steyve Colgan, Mandeep Dhami, Adrian Weller, Toby Davies, Rob Jenkins, Jon Kanevsky, Timandra Harkness, Dan Popple and the team at West Midlands police, Andy Beck, Jack Stilgoe, Caroline Rance, Paul Newman, Phyllis Illarmi, Armand Leoni, David Cope, Ed Finn, Kate Devlin, Shelia Hayman, Tom Chatwin, Carl Gombrich, Johnny Ryan, Jon Crowcroft and Frank Kelly.
There’s also Sue Webb and Debbie Enright from Network Typing and Sharon Richardson, Shruthi Rao and Will Storr, whose help in wrestling this book into shape was invaluable. Plus, once I had finally something approaching sentences written down, James Fulker, Elisabeth Adlington, Brendan Maginnis, Ian Hunter, Omar Miranda, Adam Dennett, Michael Veale, Jocelyn Bailey, Cat Black, Tracy Fry, Adam Rutherford and Thomas Oléron Evans, all helped me find the biggest flaws and beat them into submission. And Geoff Dahl, who, as well as offering moral support throughout this entire process, also had the very clever idea for the cover design.
Very many thanks to my peer reviewers: Elizabeth Cleverdon, Bethany Davies, Ben Dickson, Mike Downes, Charlie and Laura Galan, Katie Heath, Mia Kazi-Fornari, Fatah Ioualitene, Siobhan Mathers, Mabel Smaller, Ali Seyhun Saral, Jennifer Shelley, Edward Steele, Daniel Vesma, Jass Ubhi.
I am also unimaginably grateful to my family, for their unwavering support and steadfast loyalty. Phil, Tracy, Natalie, Marge & Parge, Omar, Mike and Tania – you were more patient with me than I often deserved. (Although don’t take that too literally, because I probably am going to write another book, and I need you to help me again, OK?)
And last, but by no means least, Edith. Frankly, you were no help whatsoever, but I wouldn’t have had it any other way.