To Teri Hayden my agent and friend.
Thank you to Elisabeth Schmitz for encouraging me to write this.
Katie Raissian for your guidance and care. (As well as patience for a man who wrote a book on an iPad and lost the first draft).
To the entire Grove team, especially Morgan Entrekin, Deb Seager, Justina Batchelor, Judy Hottensen, Julia Berner-Tobin, Gretchen Mergenthaler, and Sal Destro.
Thanks also to Anna Stein my wonderful literary agent.
The team at Picador UK, especially Ravi Mirchandani, Gaby Quattromini, Gillian Fitzgerald-Kelly, and Katie Green.
To Cormac Kinsella.
Gratitude to my family: Donal, Tom, Breda, and Margaret for their loyalty, love, and sense of humor.
To the memory of my mother Eileen, my father Dan, and Marian my sister, who live on in my heart.
Finally my children Romy, Jack, and Maisie, lights of my life.