ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

There are so many people who have helped take this book from an idea in my head to a fully formed novel, and I’m indebted to each and every one of them for their insight, advice, patience and good humour.

I’m indebted, in particular, to my wonderful team of editors, Alison Hennessey, Kate Harvey and Jade Chandler who have complemented each other’s work so seamlessly and so excellently over the last eighteen months.

Thanks also to team Harvill Seeker, especially Anna Redman for her tireless work over the last two years travelling the length and breadth of the country publicising the book and visiting every Travelodge en route, September Withers for marketing the book so enthusiastically, Kris Potter for his wonderful artwork and Alison Tullet for her eagle eyes. Thanks too, to Liz Foley, Rachel Cugnoni, Richard Cable, Bethan Jones, Alex Russell, Tom Drake-Lee, Penny Liechti and the wider team at Vintage for believing in Sam and Surrender-not and for being so supportive.

I’m grateful to my agent, Sam Copeland, the handsomest man in publishing, for having faith in me, and to the team at Rogers Coleridge and White for all their hard work.

Thank you to my wife, Sonal, whose love and support makes everything possible, and to my boys, Milan and Aran, for bringing chaos to our lives.

A debt of gratitude is owed to Val McDermid, as well as to Vaseem Khan and the other members of Team Dishoom for their support, to the staff of the Idea Store in Canary Wharf for giving me a place to write, and to Yoana Karamitrova for keeping Sonal and me sane.

Thanks of course, to all those good friends who let me borrow their names without worrying about what I’d do with them: to my old art teacher, Mr Wilson, to Derek Carmichael, Nicholas Portelli, Vivek Arora, and Rajan Kumar, to my partners at Houghton Street Capital, Hash Davé, Neeraj Bhardwaj and Alok Gangola – you are like family to me and you owe me for not making any of you a eunuch.

And finally, a special thank you to Adhir Sahaye, Punit Bedi and Mark Golding – sorry for killing you.