From afar, writing might seem like a much more solitary endeavor than it is in reality. A very large number of people contributed to the book you hold in your hands.
First, so much gratitude to my editor for The Water Outlaws, Ruoxi Chen. From large-scale plotline reassurance to nitty-gritty discussions of province names, Ruoxi not only shepherded this book to publication but has been its most heartfelt cheerleader. She brought so much love for the source material and wider cultural understanding to this project, and it’s been a joy to indulge in this journey with her. Also at the top of the list to thank are my agent, Russell Galen, and my film agent, Angela Cheng Caplan, whose unwavering support continues to make my career what it is. It’s been a hard time to be a writer, especially through the last few rocky pandemic years—without my agents I would not even be in a position to write or share books with you.
So many other talented professionals have had a part in making The Water Outlaws reality. Illustrator Feifei Ruan created the stunning cover art for this book, and I hope she knows that reader reaction to it has been an absolute home run. Cultural consultant Yvonne Ye read for authenticity, language, and history, and commented with such a brilliant level of scholarship that the edit letter threw me into clouds of geeky joy. (And you got my Chinese puns!) I’m additionally grateful to Tor for going the extra mile to hire an authenticity reader so we could give this book’s cultural inspirations and source material the respect they deserve—any missteps remaining are my own.
At Tor, it’s also been my absolute pleasure to work directly with assistant editor Oliver Dougherty, my publicist Giselle Gonzalez (who has seen me through several books now!), and, previously, assistant editor Sanaa Ali-Virani. The Water Outlaws is further indebted to the skills of the following people at all the myriad steps in the run-up to its release: production manager Steven Bucsok; marketer Isa Caban; designer Greg Collins; jacket designer Christine Foltzer; marketing assistant Samantha Friedlander; publisher Irene Gallo; production editor Dakota Griffin; copyeditor Amanda Hong; managing editor Lauren Hougen; proofreader NaNá Stoelzle; cold reader Cassie Gitkin; and operations wranglers Michelle Foytek, Rebecca Naimon, and Erin Robinson.
On the UK side, I’m extremely grateful for the enthusiasm of commissioning editor Michael Rowley at Solaris, and now for my utterly amazing team there of editor Amanda Rutter, editorial assistant Chiara Mestieri, and PR and marketing manager Jess Gofton—your collective excitement for this book has been making the UK release feel straight-up magical!
Finally, I want to give a shoutout to Diana Gill, my prior editor at Tor, for kicking off this whole journey.
Outside of my agency and publishers, I am lucky beyond compare to have had my sister join me for this book every step of the way, from reading every chapter as I drafted to waxing enthusiastic about Wu Yong to decisively acting as a sounding board during my copyedits. Maddox Hahn and Emma Maree Urquhart gave me astute critical feedback on the proposal and initial chapters and helped me solidify my vision for the plot and characters. Jesse Sutanto read an early version of the manuscript and has been an invaluable source of advice. Federica Fedeli did me the favor of proofreading my Italian at the last minute. (Grazie mille!) Many more of my author friends and colleagues and my larger writer communities have also offered helping hands in ways too many to list, including but not limited to the members of the Codex Writers’ Group, Dream Foundry (and the R3K book club!), and my various deeply wonderful writer chats (you know who you are!)—who answered my research questions, sent me resources, gave me perspective, and helped me brainstorm everything from capitalization schema to pronoun decisions to logline wording (“ungovernable gender”!). I want to particularly highlight the members of my BIPOC and queer communities for their extremely thoughtful support, whether they were giving me feedback on how to address colorism and Li Kui, talking through modern Chinese approaches to nonbinary familial honorifics with me, or holding my hand regarding the intersections of identity, publishing, marketing, and reader expectation. I wish I could mention everyone by name; I only hope I can pay this support back and forward.
Whether or not they gave me direct help with the book, my friends and family—both those who are writers and those who aren’t—are invaluable to my life, and I would not be able to write or publish without them. You know what you all do for me. Without you I’d be lost.
Last but not least, I’d be remiss if I didn’t credit a few public figures who sculpted the long tradition this book joins. The original, marvelous fourteenth-century classic Water Margin—which is the source material that this book reimagines—is attributed to Shi Nai’an. In writing The Water Outlaws, I additionally depended on the translations of J. H. Jackson (with updates by Edwin Lowe), Sidney Shapiro, and John and Alex Dent-Young. Though in general I have attempted to create my own versions of any English representations of Shi Nai’an’s work, the translations of the Mus’ nicknames—“the Unrestrained” and “the Slightly Restrained”—are my favorite decision of Shapiro’s and are dropped in as an intended homage to the role of his translation in Water Margin’s history. I am also indebted to John Zhu of Chinese Lore Podcasts for his audio retelling of Water Margin and its extensive cultural and historical notes—and for answering a research question of mine on air that I couldn’t figure out myself for the life of me! (I didn’t use the answer, sorry—Wu Yong carrying a chain weapon is just too cool! But I was delighted to know!) If anyone would like to read the original Water Margin in English, Zhu’s podcast is my recommended version and can be found at outlawsofthemarsh.com.
And though they lived far in the mists of time, I think it right to mention the real historical figures whom Shi Nai’an fictionalized in Water Margin and whom I have taken further liberties with here. Song Jiang, Emperor Huizong, Cai Jing, Gao Qiu, Zhou Tong, and Hua Tuo were all real people. (Though perhaps some of them wouldn’t be happy to be immortalized this way.…) I also brazenly borrowed the names, histories, or work of several other real people on my own—General Han Shizhong, who was husband to the Song Dynasty’s most famous female general (General Liang Hongyu); Zeng Gongliang, the Song Dynasty scholar who recorded the earliest known formulas for gunpowder in the Wujing Zongyao; Shen Kuo, a polymath scientist of the Song Dynasty; and Qu Yuan, poet and author of the real Heavenly Questions. I like to hope they would get a kick out of having a cameo here a millennium or two later!