Acknowledgments

When I was young, my family made annual trips from Oregon to the coast of northern California to visit my grandmother. Those long drives through the redwoods—with the curvy roads, audiobooks on cassette tapes, and forests veiled by fog—always seemed like magic. I remember wanting to capture that magic, to find a way to bring it home with me.

Decades later, I set out to do just that. And I couldn’t have done it alone.

To my agent, Sarah Landis, for being the best champion that I could ever ask for. Thank you for all of your support and your expertise. I’m so glad to be part of Team Landis. And a big shout-out to the rest of the team at Sterling Lord Literistic.

To my editor, Martha Mihalick, who just got me and my writing from that very first phone call. Thank you for your thoughtful guidance, for making this book the best it could be, and for the adorable cat pictures.

To Virginia Duncan, for giving me the chance to be part of the Greenwillow family. And to the rest of the team: Arianna Robinson, Lois Adams, Sylvie Le Floc’h, and my sharp-eyed copy editor, Laaren Brown. To the brilliant marketing squad: Vaishali Nayak, Delaney Heisterkamp, Mitch Thorpe, and all the wonderful people working on Shelf Stuff.

To Izzy Burton, for illustrating my dream cover. I am so happy every time I look at it.

To Ryan O’Rourke, for bringing the town of Aldermere to life.

To the people who have been with me from the very start. First of all, to my mother for being my cheerleader, beta reader, occasional therapist, and assistant cat wrangler. I couldn’t have done it without you. To Dad, for all of the motivation. To Diana, for all the sisterly support. To my cousins, Kasey and Roman, for being both friends and family. To Lynden, for being an amazing aunt and one of the few people who could drive Highway 1 without making me nauseated.

And to the next generation of readers: Roland and Floyd. You have many amazing years of reading ahead of you.

Being an author is often a solitary endeavor, so I’m very grateful to all of my friends who’ve been with me on various parts of this journey. To s.e. smith, for being one of the first people to hear about Aldermere and for explaining how Fin couldn’t get locked in a water tower. To Deth P. Sun, for going with me on that train at Confusion Hill despite the conductor announcing that a derailment was inevitable. To Rosiee Thor, for always being there when I need dog pictures or plant advice. To Mary Elizabeth Summer, who listened to a rough draft of Chapter Two and told me I had to keep going. To Catherine Garbinsky, for coming up with the perfect pun coffee shop name. To Katherine Locke, for all the support as I was halfway through a first draft at space camp. And to all the friends I made at Launch Pad 2019—particularly Diana Rowland, for making sure that our van didn’t slide off the edge of a mountain.

To all the booksellers and the librarians. You’re the ones putting magic into people’s hands and I appreciate you so much.

And specifically, to Alysha Welliver, Gabrielle Belisle, Kalie Barnes-Young, Alex Abraham, and Lily Tschudi-Campbell.

To all the bookish people who have promoted/talked/tweeted/instagrammed/reviewed my books, I owe you a big thanks.

And lastly to you, dear reader. Thank you for picking up this book.

May you find the magic you seek.