Ironopolis
Page 38
So I hope you find this, Peg. And I hope it brings you some solace until, like me, you find your way out and into the light.
Acknowledgements
Thank you to my parents John and Jaqueline, and to my sister Lauren. Thank you also to the rest of my family for their support and encouragement. Gracias to my friends – a million little things in this book are indebted to you all.
A huge thank you to my wonderful agent Veronique Baxter, whose faith in this book has meant so much to me. An equally large thanks to Richard Lewis Davies and all the team at Parthian, and especially to my editor Eddie Matthews, whose insights revealed aspects of the book I hadn’t even considered.
Everyone in the writing department at the University of Chichester. I am particularly grateful to Stephanie Norgate and David Swann for granting me the opportunity to study there. I can say without hyperbole that it changed my life.
To those who critiqued sections of the book in progress: Hannah Brockbank, Donna Kirstein, Stephen Cass, Gillian Thompson, Mike Coot, Mark Wright, Paul Newton-Palmer, Jem Smith, Maureen Corfield, Corrina O’Beirne, Bea Mitchell Turner, Jocelyn-Anne Harvey.
For reading larger excerpts, or the whole manuscript – sometimes more than once – I am thankful eternally to Richard Buxton, Zoe Mitchell, Jacqui Pack and Tracy Fells.
Thank you to the Leeds Savages, and to SJ Bradley at Fictions of Every Kind. Mike Bonner for his police knowledge (any surviving mistakes are mine). Sam Byers for his friendship, encouragement, and help with the book after it was done. And an extra-special thank you to Emma Claire Sweeney.
Finally, the biggest thank you of all goes to my partner Susan Barker. Without your fathomless love, support, inspiration, and faith in me, this book simply would not exist.
Financial assistance from the Arts & Humanities Research Council was vital in the writing of this book.