The blame for any of my books rests squarely on my shoulders. As for credit, there’s a lot of that to go around.
As I’m wresting example #5,162 out of the murky depths of the internet and painstakingly wrangling it into something meaningful, the one thing that keeps me going is the comforting thought that one day soon I’ll get to pour this graceless bag of words into the stunningly beautiful mold created by one Bob Stránský and watch it spring to life. The two of us, we have been down this road a number of times. I’m getting used to having all sorts of design curveballs thrown at me that have me gasping for air—calm down, he knows what he’s doing, just let it settle and maybe you’ll come around—and then inevitably realizing yes, of course, this is how it has to be, and falling in love with the design.
Thanks, man. It’s been a pleasure, as always. Keep your powder dry and your mojo working because there’s more where this came from.
There are women who spend their days nagging and sighing and rolling their eyes and sometimes going balls-to-the-wall scorched earth on their men for no discernible reason. (Not discernible to the men, anyway.) My wife would be 100% justified in doing all of those things on any given day in whatever order she pleased. Why she doesn’t is something I have the rest of my life to figure out.
And then one day, to add insult to injury, in the middle of her inexplicably doing none of the above, her husband turns to her and says, ‘Can I use the money we were going to use to fix the roof to publish another book that’s never gonna sell?’ And she goes, ‘Sure, knock yourself out.’ I mean, the f***ing nerve on that woman. What kind of a long game is she playing?
I absolutely should have thanked my parents in my very first book, and it is to both their credit that they pretty much let it slide. I know this is way too little, way too late, but thanks—you guys have each contributed in your own special way, and I do appreciate it, and I’m not being facetious here. (Althought I might be, depending on what ‘facetious’ means.)
And don’t worry mom, you don’t have to read this one either.
A well-deserved shoutout to Petr Švarc: when you volunteered to proofread one of the books for me back in the day, I was a little wary. I’d been burned a couple times, plus I’m naturally suspicious of people who... well, of people. But I took you up on your offer and boy am I glad I did. I cringe at the number of typos and logical inconsistencies that you spotted in what I thought was the final version. Thank you.