THERE ARE SO MANY PEOPLE WHO HELPED ME get here. I would like to thank just a few.

For the enthusiasm, trust, and know-how that turned my story into a book, I am profoundly grateful to my editors Tara Weikum and Catherine Onder. They patiently guided Die for Me into its finished form, and I am truly lucky to have worked with both of them.

I owe an enormous debt of gratitude to my superhuman agent, Stacey Glick, who stirred up an interest for Die for Me that surpassed my every hope. Thanks, Stacey, for believing in me from the very beginning. Thank you to Miriam Goderich for not clicking “delete” when she found my query letter in her inbox. And to Lauren E. Abramo for selling a slew of foreign rights long before the book was even published. Dystel & Goderich rocks!

My friends Mags Harnett and Nathalie Cousin listened to my initial idea and used superhuman self-control not to show their true feelings when I said I wanted to write a zombie love story. Thank you both.

Infinite love and gratefulness to Saint Laurent of the Bleeding Ears, aka my enormously supportive husband, who let me read the very first draft to him every day over lunch and tried to hide his disappointment that the bad guys didn’t show up in speedboats at the end. Thank you for having faith in me, mon amour.

Also up for canonization: my friend Claudia Depkin, who went above and beyond what I would have ever dared ask, enthusiastically volunteering to read draft after draft of the manuscript. Her daily comments were invaluable and her unflagging encouragement helped me persevere.

Thank you to those friends who let me hide out in their vacant homes for precious writing time: Nicolas Mercier and Paul Krieger for their beach apartment in Trouville and castle in Saintes; Cassi Bryn Michalik for her rooftops-view apartment in Paris; Guy for his home in the Loire; and my father-in-law, Jean-Pierre, and Christiane for their home-five-minutes-away-from-home.

Remerciements to my friend Mags Harnett for the several read-throughs and invaluable comments. Also to my sister Gretchen Scoleri, my friends Kim Lennert, James Kidd, and Sandrine Hosti, and my cousin Diana Canfield for their thoughts on the manuscript. My veteran-writer cousin-in-law Matthew Randazzo V, was of immense help with fellow-author counsel on getting published. His advice and long-distance hand-holding was much appreciated. And much thanks to my childhood friend Lou Anders, editor of Pyr Books, for his enthusiasm and for looking over my “revenant rules” to verify that my monsters made sense.

Thanks to Terry Jones for legal advice. Bill Braine for brainstorming. “Olivia” for making her opinion known and for being the book’s first true fan. Melissa Randazzo for leading my own personal cheering section. And my mother-in-law, Jeannine, for being so certain that one day I would be published.

And finally, but not least importantly, thank you to the faithful readers of Chitlins And Camembert. Your constant support and enthusiasm about my writing gave me confidence that I had stories worth telling.