It was six months before I could bear to admit to anyone that I had fallen into the throes of novel-writing. My wife and partner, Tara, was the first to learn my guilty secret. She’s a teacher in real life, which is good because there have been a lot of things in this process that I’ve needed to be taught. No matter how frantic I got, she stayed calm, held up the other side of our marriage, and helped me keep our girls alive—and thriving, even, which I think is really overachieving.
And the girls! London and Brooklyn the Daughters, who were only tiny things when this novel was begun and were giving me writing advice by the time it was finished. “Just remember that every story needs a problem,” London advised me. Her own stories have mostly involved orphans and aliens, but I’m not sure who borrowed from whom. Brooklyn has been illustrating the story for some time. “Aliens have a lot of eyes,” she told me, providing a diagram in case I didn’t understand. Funny how we both came to the same conclusion.
Chronologically speaking, Dan Hooper is up next. He’s an actual honest-to-goddess scientist, and he not only answered my cosmology questions but also introduced me to my agent, Charlie Olsen at Inkwell. And Charlie! He was the first one to see publishing potential in Tier One. “You should sign with me,” he told me, “because I’ve already got you a killer two-book deal in Germany.” I did, and I’ve never regretted it. And Charlie, of course, introduced the book to the editor who would eventually midwife it: Julian Pavia at Penguin Random House.
Julian, who is probably still shaking his head at what I consider a “minor edit.” Julian, who is an absolutely merciless literary hitman. I really can’t say enough about working with him, even after he completely murdered four of my drafts over the span of two years. I’ve never seen anyone solve galactic problems so effortlessly. What I’m trying to say is, if you ever have the chance to have Julian Pavia kill your darlings, you should jump at it.
And now we come to The Council of Four. These are the four people who read and commented on every single draft of this book—including the ones that didn’t even live long enough to be murdered. Sam Hovar found plot holes I never would have caught, and will never forgive me for what happened to Eleven. Michael Hovar brought a historical perspective, and helped me sort the insane ideas from the mostly insane. Tony Fiorito taught me a healthy terror of artificial intelligence, took my Official Author Photo, and created my first fan art. Gina Fiorito stuck up for Network intelligences the entire time, particularly in the area of gender identity. Thank you, Council, from the bottom of my Human heart.
Next up: family! My parents: Mark and Denise Jordan, a pastor and a writer who taught me what creativity was, and who somehow did not freak out that time I dropped out of college (to attempt) to be a rock star. They have encouraged me since I was crawling, and I can’t imagine they’ll ever stop. My brother Nick, who read and destroyed multiple drafts and called me every time I began sounding dangerously obsessive. My sister Emily, who showed me how to stick to things come hell or high water. My brother Ben, who has always inspired me to learn as many weird things as possible. My in-laws Jarrett, Mel, and Maria, who take care of my siblings and round out my creative juggernaut of a family. Thank you, all of you.
And speaking of creativity, have you met Vince Proce? We’ve worked together on countless projects, and he was the one who created the incredible paintings of Shenya the Widow, Mer, Roche, Sarya the Daughter, and more that are currently on my site (TheLastHuman.com). So if you’ve ever wanted to see what a Widow-toddler relationship looks like, now’s your chance.
Who else is there? Too many to list, of course. But let me at least mention some other people who read my poor slaughtered drafts. Thank you Steve Maxson, Archie Easter, Dustin Adkison, Aaron and Jamie Johnson, and Rob Daly. And if your name isn’t here, don’t think I forgot you. Thank you to all the people who have been following and even encouraging my strange career.
And now, finally, we arrive at you: the person who is holding this book. Not only did you think it was worth buying (or borrowing, or stealing, or whatever—I don’t judge), you thought it was worth reading. And not only that, you read all the way to this end of my little parade of high-fives. And for all that, I want to say thank you. And I promise you: The adventures are only beginning. See you around the Network!