The Hawthorne Legacy (The Inheritance Games #2)(93)

I am also incredibly grateful to the production team, who went out of their way to configure our schedule so that I could go on maternity leave with a new baby mid-process. Thank you, Marisa Finkelstein, Barbara Bakowski, Virginia Lawther, and Olivia Davis. Thank you also to Lisa Cahn, Janelle DeLuise, and Hannah Koerner, for helping bring this series to life in audio and overseas.

In addition to my publishing team in the United States, I would also like to thank my wonderful UK publishing team, including Anthea Townsend, Phoebe Williams, Ruth Knowles, Sara Jafari, Jane Griffiths, Kat McKenna, Rowan Ellis, and everyone else at Penguin Random House UK!

Thank you also to Josh Berman, who is developing The Inheritance Games for television. Josh, you were one of the first people to read The Inheritance Games, and your belief in this project means the world. To the rest of the team hard at work on this project, including Grainne Godfree, Jeffrey Frost, Jennifer Robinson, Alec Durkheimer, and Sam Lion—thank you!

This is my twenty-second book, and I have been incredibly lucky to have had Curtis Brown as my agency home since I was pretty much a kid myself! Thank you, Elizabeth Harding, for fighting for me for all these years. Holly Frederick, thank you not only for finding these books a wonderful Hollywood home but also for your insightful feedback on the early stages of book one. Thank you, Sarah Perillo, for your incredible work advocating for this series all over the globe. And thank you to the rest of my Curtis Brown team, including Nicole Eisenbraun, Sarah Gerton, Michaela Glover, Madeline Tavis, and Jazmia Young.

Writing is a solitary profession; this year, that solitude was taken up a notch. I am grateful for all the writing friends who made this process less lonely along the way. Thank you to Ally Carter, Rachel Vincent, Emily Lockhart, Sarah Mlynowski, and all of BOB for the tremendous amounts of writerly support, and to the fellow authors who have been incredibly supportive of this series, including Katharine McGee, Karen McManus, Kat Ellis, Dahlia Adler, and so many more.

As is probably obvious by this point, the writing and publishing of a book is a true team effort. For this book, written in one of the hardest and most chaotic periods of my life, I am also hugely indebted to my team at home. Thank you to Avery Eshelman and Ruth Davis, for helping take care of my kids while I wrote, and thank you to my family, for EVERYTHING. Anthony, I could not ask for a better partner. Thank you for all you do; I could not do this without you. To my mom and dad, thank you for always being just a phone call away and for all you have done to help us through this difficult time. And to my children, thank you for the snuggles and fun, but also for understanding that sometimes Mommy has to write!

Finally, thank YOU, dear reader! After all these years and twenty-two books, I am still in awe that the stories I write are read by people like you.