I WISH TO EXPRESS my sincere gratitude to everyone who helped with this project—the parents and former children who suffered through my endless questions; to Anna Quindlen, for agreeing to perform (and edit) the interview that provides the afterword to this work; to editors Deb Futter, Gerry Howard, Christine Pride, and Lindsay Sagnette at Random House; and to my agent Kris Dahl at ICM, for standing by me these last twenty years. I want to particularly thank my assistant, Grant Patch, for all the research he did on my behalf, as well as for transcribing many of the interviews. Other interviews were transcribed by Verbal Ink Transcription Services (www.verbalink.com).

I’m especially thankful to Augusten Burroughs, who first suggested that I write this book over a dinner of burning-hot food at Spice Market, in Manhattan; it’s probably worth mentioning that in reply I told Augusten that I was “all done with memoir” and “all done with gender.” Augusten is also responsible for the photograph of Edward Albee as well as the author photo.

I’m grateful to my colleagues and students at Colby College in Maine, as well as at Ursinus College in Collegeville, Pennsylvania. It was Ursinus’s president, the late John Strassburger, who, along with English professor Jon Volkmer, brought me to that campus for the fall of 2010 and invented the position of Grace Hoyer/John Updike Distinguished Visiting Creative Writer for me. I miss him.

Above all, I’m grateful to my family—my parents and my sister; my brave, glorious sons, Zachary and Sean; and to the incomparable Deedie Finney Boylan, whose love has made my life possible.