Future Perfect
Page 23
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I would like to first of all acknowledge that I am among the luckiest of humans and I am so grateful.
This book wouldn’t exist without my amazing agent, Cheryl Pientka, who said, You should be writing YA.
This book also wouldn’t exist without the lovely Claire Zulkey, who asked me over the course of an interview about my first book, “What are you working on next?” I responded, chirpily, “A young adult novel!”
This book certainly would not exist without my brilliant editor, Kristen Pettit, who made me burst into tears on the California Zephyr train somewhere between Salt Lake City and San Francisco, as I read her first email to me. She wanted that YA book, and then helped make it far better than I could have hoped.
This book couldn’t exist without beautiful Monique van den Cullen, who has always been my model for body confidence and self-esteem, and who has been bitching with me about the need for awesome fat protagonists in books for, like, 20 years. Hers is next, you guys.
This book shouldn’t exist because I went through an infinitely long existential crisis trying to write it, trying to make it right, but the so-astonishing Karen Meisner put her arms around me literally and figuratively and helped me keep all my pieces together.
This book almost didn’t exist because still I froze and stared wildly around me, startling at bright noises and loud lights, but my gorgeous Kelsey Van Tassel, of the greatest name and the loveliest heart, showed me the past, the present, and the future. Her love and support and belief in me are some of the greatest gifts I’ve ever been given.
This book went on to exist because the beautiful and gifted Sage Romano kept kicking my ass and taking my name and providing me with an extraordinary, inspiring example of an incredibly hardworking, dedicated, talented writer.
This book, now in existence, would not be nearly so beautiful without the amazing talent of Sarah Kaufman, whose patience was endless and whose design just glows, and Ellice M. Lee, the immensely talented layout design artist who made it just as pretty on the inside.
This book would not be so cohesive, smart, grammatically correct (will I ever, ever be able to figure out lay and lie or will I die ashamed?), and error free without genius copyeditor, Claire Caterer; razor-sharp proofreader, Tania Bissell; and production editor, Alexandra Alexo, who orchestrated the whole thing. You are completely the best.
The whole process of publishing a book, from submitting a manuscript to answering dumb author questions like “What? An author questionnaire?” to shifting around covers and flaps and copyedits and page proofs and all the endless important bits, wouldn’t have gone so smoothly and happily and well without the basic awesomeness of Elizabeth Lynch.
I wouldn’t exist without my very cute mom, from whom all the things I am have sprung. She has always tried to protect me and has always loved me fiercely.
So much love and many thanks for above-and-beyond kindnesses, support, giggle-snorts, and general wonderfulness to: my aunt, Elizabeth Fitzgerald; my brother, Ken Larsen, sister-in-law, Carrie Ellman, and perfect nephew, Oliver; the astonishing Alex Duke; oldest friend, Rodrigo Trujillo; quietly and enduringly supportive Justin Pierce; ridiculously beautiful-faced and -hearted Jenny Shaw, Kristin Guthrie Brandt, Brooke Duncan, Brittany Woods, and Heather Haskett; immortal beloved Amy Hawkins; and the very attractive Jeff Dillon, who has many excellent qualities.
If I have forgotten anyone, it is because I have a mind like a steel sieve, and I am sorry and I love you because you are a perfect you, inside and out.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
PHOTO BY KAREN MEISNER
JEN LARSEN is the author of the widely acclaimed adult memoir Stranger Here: How Weight-Loss Surgery Transformed My Body and Messed with My Head, which chronicles her own real-life journey with weight-loss surgery. This is her first work of fiction.
WWW.JENLARSEN.NET
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CREDITS
COVER DESIGN AND ILLUSTRATIONS BY SARAH NICHOLE KAUFMAN
COPYRIGHT
HarperTeen is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
FUTURE PERFECT. Copyright © 2015 by Jen Larsen. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Larsen, Jen, 1973–
Future perfect / Jen Larsen. — First edition.
pages cm
Summary: “Ashley is offered the chance to have weight-loss surgery by her exacting grandmother, who promises to provide tuition to her dream college in return” — Provided by publisher.
ISBN 978-0-06-232123-7 (hardback)
EPub Edition © September 2015 ISBN 9780062321251
[1. Self-esteem—Fiction. 2. Overweight persons—Fiction. 3. Grandmothers—Fiction. 4. Single-parent families—Fiction. 5. Weight loss—Fiction.] I. Title.
PZ7.1.L36Fut 2015 2015006004
[Fic]—dc23 CIP
AC
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15 16 17 18 19 CG/RRDH 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
FIRST EDITION
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