Collision Theory

by Adrian Todd Zuniga

  Thank you to Beck’s Sea Change album, specifically the song “Lost Cause,” to which many of the saddest parts of this book were written.

  Thank you to Mark Strand and his story “Space,” which I read all the way back in 2002.

  Thank you to Tobias Wolff, Amanda Filipacchi, George Saunders, Marilynne Robinson, Etgar Keret, Dave Eggers, Aimee Bender, Richard Ford, Ben Fountain, Stephen King, and Chuck Palahniuk.

  Thank you to my friends who put up with me and supported this book knowingly or unknowingly: Ben Mainwaring, Matt Herlihy, James J. Williams III, Pierre Blaizeau, Shya Scanlon, Rish Manepalli, Sabrina Howells, John Davison, J. Ryan Stradal, Amelia Gray, Jacob Tomsky, Dakota Lupo, Kevin Dolgin, Pia Z. Ehrhardt, Roy Kesey, John Leary, and Mike Young. I realize I am forgetting most everyone, including you, and I’m going to be very embarrassed that you are not listed in here, but please do trust when I emphatically apologize and tell you that I should have listed you here. I promise I mean it.

  Thank you to my brothers and sisters, my father, and most especially my mother, who lives so strongly in this book and who’s roar lives so strongly in me.

  And thank you to Morgan Tanswell, whose love and care for this book, and for me, were the rocket fuel needed to bring it, and me, from there to here.