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Dedication:
To Justin, For believing in this long before I did. |
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Acknowledgements:
This book was almost a decade in the making, and so many people contributed in that time to my growth as a writer and as a person. I will do my very best to acknowledge them all here, but if you played a role in my life in the last ten years, you left your mark in some way or another.
Huge thanks to my earliest readers: Justin, Michael, Alannah, Larkin, and Mary Beth. You took a book that was raw and mostly unformed and helped me see what it could become. Through your enthusiasm and support, I started to believe that this story could be more than a fun hobby, and that I could be more than a dabbler.
I’ve been fortunate to be supported by two different writing groups, who contributed in entirely different ways to this work. First was the little informal enclave formed by friends and colleagues working in LA back in 2011-2012, who nurtured the earliest seeds of this idea — back before Jaya was even called Jaya and when the big bad was a civilization of galaxy-invading aliens. Special thanks to Joe and Jenna, whose support and feedback continued long after the group itself went its separate ways. Second was the Durham Writers Group’s SFF chapter, whose detailed and thoughtful feedback helped me clean up the draft of this book that would eventually get an offer of publication. Thank you for your detailed critiques, and for celebrating with me when I signed the contract. Community is everything, and all of you are a part of this work.
It was just a few people who really cut into what this book was and helped me see what it could become. My later readers: Ryann, Jonathan, Baxter, Joseph, and Dave. And my critique partners, who are far more precious than gold. Michelle, thank you for sticking your fingers into every plot hole and pulling until it was a giant rip I could no longer justify ignoring. Your insights and perspective made this book so much stronger, and our many talks about craft and language and story and love and life enhance my days and my words in equal measure. This wouldn’t exist without you: I would have trashed it long ago, but instead it became something better. Alannah, your thoughtful reflections on character and language helped me see my book in new ways, showing me places where I could dig deeper and give more to the characters and the world. Our lengthy discussions about art and worldbuilding and psychology and the business of being a creator have enriched my life as an author in ways I never even imagined.
To all the people who helped me in so many ways as I tried to get this book published, thank you for your willingness to provide a glimpse into your path, for the phone calls and emails and retweets and all the other little ways you supported me. To Michael Mammay and Hayley Stone, for your unflinching honesty about this process and your patience with my anxious questions. To Rachel Griffin, for your open-armed welcome into the world of the online writing community and your feedback on everything from query letters to release parties. To Cassandra Clarke and the SWFA mentorship program, for all you gave of yourself in time and effort and honesty. To the 2020 and 2021 debut groups, for giving me a home and a space to let all the scary, ugly, and fearful parts of this process out (and to celebrate the giddy highs as much as the desperate lows). Through all your efforts, you peeled aside the veil and let me not just see into the world of publishing, but take that first step on my own.
So many people outside of publishing contributed as well. To Uncle Mike, for your insights and legal expertise. To Mary Beth, for answering all my ridiculous questions about protocol and trauma care and science fiction medicine with infinite patience. To Larkin, Mary Beth, and Kate together, for enduring many floods of anxieties in the group text and always encouraging me to speak up for myself. To Leticia, for always having an open seat waiting for me at Kafe Kerouac and keeping the coffee flowing and my spirits high. To the teachers who read my middling adolescent words and saw something worth praising and encouraging and shaping. All of you kept me going in ways that are hard to tease apart: thank you.
Thank you to Aethon Books — and Rhett and Steve in particular — for giving me a chance to get my words out into the world, and for believing in me enough to ask for two sequels. Everyone involved in the publishing process works so hard, and while I don’t know everyone who was involved in prepping my book at some point, I’m grateful for all your work. To my editor, James, thank you for the time you spent making the text stronger and helping me tie together all the pieces that are so easy to lose as an author. You pushed the prose and asked the tough questions and as a result, this book came out much stronger.
Finally, I owe so much to my family, both of the blood and found variety. For cultivating a love of books and stories. For encouraging curiosity and questioning. For tolerating and maybe even joining in my philosophical meanderings. And for always, always keeping my feet firmly on the ground even while my mind roamed this universe and others.
And to Justin, who appeared in my life on the very day I finished the first draft of this book. Whose entrance in my world signaled both an ending and a beginning. If I believed in signs, you would be one. But I don’t believe in signs: I believe in you, and I believe in us. Thank you for being there for all the parts of me. The elation and the heartache. The anxieties and the hopes. The scientist and the artist. You see me, and I can’t begin to find the words for what that means to me.
I could only dream when I started this novel that it would be out there in the world. I never could have imagined that would grow into the story that it is today. Thank you, readers, for letting me share this world with you. I hope it brings you as much joy and catharsis as it has brought me.
This book was almost a decade in the making, and so many people contributed in that time to my growth as a writer and as a person. I will do my very best to acknowledge them all here, but if you played a role in my life in the last ten years, you left your mark in some way or another.
Huge thanks to my earliest readers: Justin, Michael, Alannah, Larkin, and Mary Beth. You took a book that was raw and mostly unformed and helped me see what it could become. Through your enthusiasm and support, I started to believe that this story could be more than a fun hobby, and that I could be more than a dabbler.
I’ve been fortunate to be supported by two different writing groups, who contributed in entirely different ways to this work. First was the little informal enclave formed by friends and colleagues working in LA back in 2011-2012, who nurtured the earliest seeds of this idea — back before Jaya was even called Jaya and when the big bad was a civilization of galaxy-invading aliens. Special thanks to Joe and Jenna, whose support and feedback continued long after the group itself went its separate ways. Second was the Durham Writers Group’s SFF chapter, whose detailed and thoughtful feedback helped me clean up the draft of this book that would eventually get an offer of publication. Thank you for your detailed critiques, and for celebrating with me when I signed the contract. Community is everything, and all of you are a part of this work.
It was just a few people who really cut into what this book was and helped me see what it could become. My later readers: Ryann, Jonathan, Baxter, Joseph, and Dave. And my critique partners, who are far more precious than gold. Michelle, thank you for sticking your fingers into every plot hole and pulling until it was a giant rip I could no longer justify ignoring. Your insights and perspective made this book so much stronger, and our many talks about craft and language and story and love and life enhance my days and my words in equal measure. This wouldn’t exist without you: I would have trashed it long ago, but instead it became something better. Alannah, your thoughtful reflections on character and language helped me see my book in new ways, showing me places where I could dig deeper and give more to the characters and the world. Our lengthy discussions about art and worldbuilding and psychology and the business of being a creator have enriched my life as an author in ways I never even imagined.
To all the people who helped me in so many ways as I tried to get this book published, thank you for your willingness to provide a glimpse into your path, for the phone calls and emails and retweets and all the other little ways you supported me. To Michael Mammay and Hayley Stone, for your unflinching honesty about this process and your patience with my anxious questions. To Rachel Griffin, for your open-armed welcome into the world of the online writing community and your feedback on everything from query letters to release parties. To Cassandra Clarke and the SWFA mentorship program, for all you gave of yourself in time and effort and honesty. To the 2020 and 2021 debut groups, for giving me a home and a space to let all the scary, ugly, and fearful parts of this process out (and to celebrate the giddy highs as much as the desperate lows). Through all your efforts, you peeled aside the veil and let me not just see into the world of publishing, but take that first step on my own.
So many people outside of publishing contributed as well. To Uncle Mike, for your insights and legal expertise. To Mary Beth, for answering all my ridiculous questions about protocol and trauma care and science fiction medicine with infinite patience. To Larkin, Mary Beth, and Kate together, for enduring many floods of anxieties in the group text and always encouraging me to speak up for myself. To Leticia, for always having an open seat waiting for me at Kafe Kerouac and keeping the coffee flowing and my spirits high. To the teachers who read my middling adolescent words and saw something worth praising and encouraging and shaping. All of you kept me going in ways that are hard to tease apart: thank you.
Thank you to Aethon Books — and Rhett and Steve in particular — for giving me a chance to get my words out into the world, and for believing in me enough to ask for two sequels. Everyone involved in the publishing process works so hard, and while I don’t know everyone who was involved in prepping my book at some point, I’m grateful for all your work. To my editor, James, thank you for the time you spent making the text stronger and helping me tie together all the pieces that are so easy to lose as an author. You pushed the prose and asked the tough questions and as a result, this book came out much stronger.
Finally, I owe so much to my family, both of the blood and found variety. For cultivating a love of books and stories. For encouraging curiosity and questioning. For tolerating and maybe even joining in my philosophical meanderings. And for always, always keeping my feet firmly on the ground even while my mind roamed this universe and others.
And to Justin, who appeared in my life on the very day I finished the first draft of this book. Whose entrance in my world signaled both an ending and a beginning. If I believed in signs, you would be one. But I don’t believe in signs: I believe in you, and I believe in us. Thank you for being there for all the parts of me. The elation and the heartache. The anxieties and the hopes. The scientist and the artist. You see me, and I can’t begin to find the words for what that means to me.
I could only dream when I started this novel that it would be out there in the world. I never could have imagined that would grow into the story that it is today. Thank you, readers, for letting me share this world with you. I hope it brings you as much joy and catharsis as it has brought me.
