To my family: Chuck Cahoy, my person. I don’t how I got so lucky in life to find you. To quote a Patti LaBelle song, “I’ve been looking around and you were here all the time.” To my mother, Shelley Doctors; my father, Bob Konigsberg; my stepmother, Roz Konigsberg; my sister, Pam Yoss; and my brother, Dan Konigsberg: I love you all very much.
To Nick Thomas, who was with me through the first and second drafts, and who championed this novel. Your brilliant footprint is all over this book. You are part of it and always will be. Thank you.
To David Levithan, who took on the gargantuan task of editing this monster: I will be forever grateful to you for your keen eye and brilliance.
Linda Epstein, my agent, friend, and biggest fan: Thank you for your love and support.
Thanks to Annika Browne and Kate Moehler for talking to me about mental health issues, including mania and hypomania. Thanks to Miguel Guillon for housing me in Washington Heights when I was doing my research. Big thanks to Lisa Athan and Scotty Fried for talking to me about grief from a counseling perspective. Thanks to Laila Fowlkes, Helen Pinto-Scherstuhl, Bree Irvin, and Rosalyn Collings Eves for giving me the inside scoop on fifth-grade girls. Officer Trever Sweeney was helpful in understanding how police handle notifying families in the case of a suicide. Imi Jackson gave me insight into the world of Throne of Glass and Sarah J. Maas fans.
Huge assist to my first-draft readers, who had to wade through quite a lot of mess to see the beginnings of a story: Pamela Kirkland, Cindy Minnich, Travis Reyes, Alice Hayes, Jaymie Theissen, Francine Rockney, Brigid Kemmerer, Chris Unger, Dave Hughes, Julie Stokes, and Wendy Poteet.
And last but never, ever least: my Scholastic family. I don’t know where I am without your huge assistance, but it’s certainly not doing the thing I love so much.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Bill Konigsberg is the author of six novels, including the Stonewall Book Award– and PEN Center USA Literary Award–winning The Porcupine of Truth and the Sid Fleischman Award for Humor–winning Openly Straight. In 2018, the National Council of Teachers of English’s Assembly on Literature for Adolescents (ALAN) established the Bill Konigsberg Award for Acts and Activism for Equity and Inclusion through Young Adult Literature. Bill loves all Labradoodles, including his best friends Mabel and Buford, and many people, including his husband, Chuck. They live in Phoenix.
Copyright © 2020 by Bill Konigsberg
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The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Jacket design and art © 2020 by Baily Crawford
First edition, September 2020
e-ISBN 978-1-338-32505-8
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