ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This one was a difficult one . . .

Many people helped me through the writing of this novel, with insights and support, with food and good cheer, or with just being there. My deepest thanks and affection to my family, above all, for living through the good times (there were a few, right?!) and the bad times (plenty of those!) as I wrestled with the plot and the writing and a rewarding but demanding full-time job.

Thanks to those who read the drafts and offered comments and advice. To my wife, Barbara, my parents, John and Margaret, and my sisters, Cassie and Amy. Thanks as well to friends and colleagues, in particular to Number One Fan (aka Marina Throne-Holst), Ben Negus, Séverine Rey, and Marina Konovalova, whose insights and comments into Russian and Soviet thinking were invaluable. Franz Boettcher helped out enormously with research on Berlin’s locations and infrastructure, and with German history, idioms, and culture. My cousin, Dominic Barrett, helped out with Russian drinking customs! Ion Mills at my British publishers, No Exit Press, was a reliable font of wisdom, good cheer, and culinary destinations in London. Thanks as always to Ryan and Tamara at Geneva Fitness for keeping the bar high; many’s the time I literally worked out frustrations with plot and character! A shout-out to the “dawn patrol” as well (you know who you are!). Lastly, I want in particular to acknowledge the contribution of Chelsea Starling, my friend and website designer extraordinaire, who insisted that Reinhardt had to have something to live for, that his life could not be all wrack and ruin. She was right.

My thanks to my editors, Tom Colgan and Amanda Ng, and to my agent, Peter Rubie, for keeping things on an even keel.