ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I raise my martini to my editor, Liz Scheier, who is a rare combination of book smart, market smart, and people smart, and knew just what to say to guide and encourage me and keep me on the right side of the bestiality laws; and I owe a martini to assistant editor Kaitlin Heller, who has been amazingly efficient and incredibly kind during this unusually unsettled time. Shauna Summers and Jessica Sebor, thanks for taking such good care of me. My husband, Mark, son, Matthew, and daughter, Elinor, were wonderfully tolerant as I spent two or three months (the days blurred) in a caffeine-fueled writing frenzy, and my mother, Ziva, spent a week going over the manuscript and spotting the awkward, the inadvisable, and the downright inexplicable. Last but never least, thanks to Meg Ruley, my agent, for being both wise and clever, and helping me take this walk on the wild side.