Maura Milan, for always being there to light up the dark times, and for your unwavering belief in this book from the beginning. My ride-or-die publishing confidant, Amy Spalding, for being the first person I text when things get weird, or when I just have a dumb question about copyedits. Thank you to Victoria Schwab, for giving me the best advice at the best possible time: that the stories we write out of anger and frustration are often the ones that save us. Thanks as well to my early readers Emily Wibberley, Mason Deaver, and Kristin Dwyer, for loving these characters as much as I do. And thank you to Sasha Reid, for always believing in me, and to Kerri Maniscalco, for getting on the phone with a complete stranger to convince me I had to sign with Barbara (you were so right).

Thank you to the Bibliothèque Mazarine, for issuing me a reader’s card not once but twice. I wrote a significant amount of this story in your reading room, where I felt absolutely transported into the past.

I’m also indebted to the many authors who have paved the way for queer fantasy, and for those writers, agents, editors, librarians, booksellers, reviewers, and readers who are working to lift up and bring more stories into the world that reflect our beautifully diverse reality.

And thank you to my readers, those who have stuck with me since the days of YouTube videos, those who grew up with my contemporary novels, and those who have just arrived at the party. I wouldn’t get to do any of this without your continued support and enthusiasm.

Now let’s meet back here in a year to discuss the next installment. Deal? Deal.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Robyn Schneider grew up in Southern California, where she spent her childhood reading fantasy novels and searching for secret passages. She’s a graduate of Columbia University, where she studied creative writing, and the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, where she earned a Masters of Bioethics. Robyn is the bestselling author of The Beginning of Everything, Extraordinary Means, Invisible Ghosts, and You Don’t Live Here. Her work is available across the world in over a dozen languages. She lives in Los Angeles with her TV producer husband, their tiny puppy, and far too many books.

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