First and foremost, huge thanks to Liz Welch, my coauthor, who made every moment of writing and researching this book with her a pleasure. Her diligence, curiosity, extreme smarts, organization, and attention to deadlines were a gift. I can’t wait to do this with her again.
Huge thanks also to Jonathan Burnham at HarperCollins, for trusting me to write this and pairing me with the wonderful editor Jennifer Barth, whose extreme intelligence and unobtrusive manner nudged me at crucial times in a much better direction.
To the cover designer Robin Bilardello and the whole HarperCollins team: Tina Andreadis, Leslie Cohen, Stephanie Cooper, Doug Jones, and Erin Wicks.
To Bob Barnett who educated me on the New York publishing business amid many chocolate malts from Shake Shack.
For sharing their remarkable insight, wisdom, and research so generously: David Adams; Mary Aiken, PhD; Gail Dines, PhD; Leah Fessler; Helen Fisher, PhD; Cindy Gallop; Justin Garcia, PhD; Elizabeth Gregory, PhD; Sarah Hepola; Sylvia Ann Hewlett; David Jernigan, PhD; Steve Kardian; Marcelle Karp; Ian Kerner, PhD; Logan Levkoff; Wednesday Martin, PhD; Esther Perel; Sean Rad; Tanya Selvaratnam; Rachel Sklar; Julie Spira; Jean Twenge, PhD; Sharon Wilsnack, PhD; and Whitney Wolfe.
And to the fantastic editors at Cosmopolitan and Marie Claire, with whom I have argued, learned, raged, and fallen about laughing. They are all feisty, funny, and fabulous: Joyce Chang, Leslie Yazel, Sara Austin, Laura Brounstein, Marina Khidekel, Abigail Pesta, Lea Goldman, Emily Johnson, Angela Ledgerwood, Lucy Kaylin, Anne Fulenwider, Julie Vadnal, Emily Johnson, Holly Whidden, Michele Promaulayko, Leah Wyar, Aya Kanai, Tiffany Reid, Amy Odell, Lori Fradkin, Kate Lewis, Matthew Hussey, Steven Brown, James Worthington DeMolet, Logan Hill, and Sergio Kletnoy.
To my brilliantly patient and resourceful assistant, Heather Passaro.
And to two of the best publishers in the business, Nancy Berger and Donna Lagani.
To our fact-checker Jennifer Kelly Geddes, transcriber Martha Sorren, and all the early readers, including Gabriella Cirelli and Olivia Winn.
To my corporate Hearst colleagues David Carey and Michael Clinton, whose daily support, smarts, and sense of humor makes work such a pleasure.
To Dave Bernad, the executive producer, and the entire team at Freeform, led by Karey Burke, Tom Ascheim, and Simran Sethi, who encouraged everyone at The Bold Type to be as real and unapologetic as possible around the issues impacting young women.
And for the genius casting of Melora Hardin, Katie Stevens, Meghann Fahy, Aisha Dee, Sam Page, and Matt Ward, whose talent and craft have brought many of these complicated issues to the screen so effectively in the show.
And then to my friends and fellow authors who encouraged me and energetically lent their suggestions as I moaned to them about spending my weekends writing: Jane Thynne, Daisy Goodwin, Georgina Godwin, Colleen DeCourcy, Sheryl Sandberg, Arianna Huffington, Mika Brzezinski, Nell Scovell, Deb Spar, and Susan Mercandetti for pushing me to get on with it.
To Mum, Dad, Liz, Con, Mary, Peter, Thomas, and Hugo.
And a special thanks to the many, many people who have trusted me over the years with their personal stories and frustrations and longings, and who for privacy reasons didn’t want their real names published. As I said in the foreword, this book is for you.