"Everywhere That Mary Went" - читать интересную книгу автора (Scottoline Lisa)

Acknowledgments

I think it was Chekhov or Tolstoy, one or the other, who said something about someone being the most extraordinary ordinary person he’d ever met. Such people exist, I know, because I’m friends with them, and I met many others in researching and writing this novel. In fact, I know so many of them by now that I’m quite sure they constitute the world’s sum total, and I worry that you are fresh out of luck.

The first such person is my agent, Linda Hayes of Columbia Literary Associates. It was Kermit the Frog-I’m on firmer ground here-who said something about the wonderful things that can happen when one whole person believes in you. Linda was the first one whole person (not related to me by blood or affection) to believe in me. She nurtured me, and this book, as if she had given birth to both of us. Linda is truly extraordinary. I am forever in her debt.

And she’s a great judge of character. She introduced me to Carolyn Marino, another extraordinary ordinary person, who became my editor at HarperCollins. Carolyn believed too, and I thank her for that. Also, while she appreciated what worked in the novel, she knew how to improve it. That she managed to tell me so, and for me still to find the editorial process so much fun, is a tribute to her grace, intelligence and sensitivity.

Thanks, too, to Chassie West, for her enormously valuable (and fun-to-read) suggestions.

I also met a number of extraordinary ordinary people in researching the book. There were good Catholics, mountain climbers, a priest, women’s health care providers, officers of my local police department and the Philadelphia Police Department, an ex-nun, an order of cloistered nuns, and Eileen at the Dusty Rhoads Gun Shop, who knows more about revolvers than anyone should. These people answered every question I had, carefully and without once checking their watches, and all I was to them was some lady with a legal pad. Thank you.

Finally, all my love and thanks to my family, the first whole people who believed, and to my daughter. To my very supportive friends-extraordinary ordinary people all-Rachel Kull, Judith Hill, Susan White, Laura Henrich, Franca Palumbo, and Jerry Hoffman. Special thanks to