My dear friend, Michelle Frey, who read several early versions of the book and who had the unenviable task of telling me that they weren’t working. Without her input, I never would have taken the leap and written a version that did work.

At Macmillan: Don Weisberg, who knew me during his time at Random House, and because of it, was willing to take a chance on an adult novel from someone previously only known for YA. Thank you, Don!

At Tor: my editors, Devi Pillai and William Hinton. They pushed me far harder than I expected … and the book is better because of it. Also in editorial: assistants Rachel Bass and Oliver Dougherty, and copy editor Christina MacDonald.

In publicity/marketing: Lucille Rettino, Eileen Lawrence, Stephanie Sarabian, Caroline Perny, Sarah Reidy, and Renata Sweeney. If you’ve heard of this book, they’re the ones responsible!

In design/production: Michelle Foytek, Greg Collins, Peter Lutjen, Jim Kapp, Rafal Gibek. Without them, the book wouldn’t have been published on time, and it sure wouldn’t have looked as good. And thanks to everyone else at Tor who has worked on this book.

Also thanks to Lindy Martin for the gorgeous cover image.

On the technical side of things: Gregory Meholic, who was kind enough to let me use his Tri-Space theory as the basis for my FTL system (as well as several of his graphs, which were redrawn for Appendix I). He also answered scores and scores of questions as I struggled to understand the specifics of how it worked. Apologies to him for bastardizing his theory in one or two places in the interests of fiction. Sorry Greg! Also Richard Gauthier—who originated the idea of TEQs—and H. David Froning Jr., who invented the technical groundwork for conditioned EM fields, which I used as the basis for my Markov Drives. And last but not least, Winchell Chung and the Atomic Rockets website (www.projectrho.com/rocket/). The best resource for anyone wanting to write realistic science fiction. Without it, the ideas in this book would have been far less interesting.

A special mention goes to the family of Felix Hofer, who were kind enough to let me use his name in this book. Felix was a reader of mine who, tragically, was killed in a motorcycle accident soon after his eighteenth birthday. We’d had some correspondence, and, well, I wanted to mark his passing and do my best to help Felix’s name live on.

As always, the biggest thanks of all go to you, dear reader. Without you, none of this would be possible! So again, thank you. Let’s do it again soon.

Christopher Paolini

September 15, 2020

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