Title Page

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Dedication

To Tim and Rachel

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I am surrounded by people of many magics. Without them, this book would not exist.

Patty, Tim, Brianna, and Bonnie Billings have never, in the two decades they’ve known me, wavered in their belief that I am a good thing to have around. Their magic is the Moore family’s magic—they are profoundly good at loving.

Rachel Paxton has been my steady companion on this journey since NaNoWriMo 2013. So much has happened in those six years: so many book drafts and blog posts and cross-country moves and hours and hours and hours on the telephone talking about writing and men and books and friends and whatever CW show we’re currently in love with or disappointed by. Here is her magic: no matter how good she was before, she’ll always be better the next time you look. Underestimate her at your peril.

Rose and Bill Savard, my in-laws, always amazed me with their ability to simply love me as I am. Bill, who passed away several years ago, had the magic of a dreamer—he thought big and loved emphatically. In recent years Rose has been one of my biggest cheerleaders: she gloats on my behalf and makes me stop, once in a while, to appreciate the present. That is, perhaps, her magic—she brings out the beauty of the moment better than anyone I know.

My beloved grandparents, Jack and Marjorie Biller, built so much of the foundation I stand upon. My grandfather was another dreamer: once he loaded two thousand pounds of lead into the garage to prove a theory about gravity. He called Berkeley regularly with updates. My grandmother, I think, was the most magical person I will ever meet, because I loved her with the magic of childhood. She taught me how to work by paying me a penny for every rock I dug out of her horse pasture; she taught me the power of place through the stories she told, the trails she built, and the birds she watched; and she taught me how to love books simply by loving them so much herself.

My friends have all listened to so many confused ramblings about writing and in addition allow me to address them as “Aunt” and “Uncle” when speaking to my dog (I am that kind of monster). To all of you, thank you for your patience and your good humor.

Isaac Skibinski’s magic is clarity of vision, which is a particularly dangerous kind of magic to have. Together we dissect the world.