Dukes to the Left of Me, Princes to the Right

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Once again, I have to thank Jen and Jenny for seeing me through—I couldn’t have done it without either one of you!

And a big thanks to my sister Devon, who’s always there to encourage me and make me laugh.

I’d also like to thank Herbert Ames. He’s a NASCAR man (and secret angel) who was wearing a white suit and a huge grin the day I met him on a plane. I was flying with Devon, and we couldn’t get seats together, which was a bad thing as my sister doesn’t like to fly. Herbert, who’s never met a stranger, said he couldn’t move as he was squashed in, but he promised to take very good care of Devon for me.

A minute later, he called up the aisle in a big, booming Southern drawl, “Kieran Kramer, are you a book writer?”

I was in a middle seat six rows ahead, so I had to stand up, turn around, and answer Herbert in front of a bunch of bored-looking people waiting for the plane to take off.

I dared myself to say, “Yes, Herbert, I am,” even though I hadn’t found a publisher yet.

And I was a book writer! I had the thousands of pages to show for it.

Well, Herbert whipped out his cell phone and called his good friend Janet, who was a writer, too, and urged her to read my book.

“Kieran Kramer’s gonna make it, I just know it!” he shouted into the phone. And then he passed it six rows up to me (everyone on the plane looked a lot less bored by this point), and I had a few words with his friend.

Janet was kind enough to read the first chapter of one of my manuscripts. She wrote me a note about it—said it had some good things and also some things that needed work but that, overall, she thought I had a wonderful voice and to hang in there.

Well, I read those encouraging words from Janet Evanovich over and over again as I wrote another story that sold months later, my first book, When Harry Met Molly. So thanks very much to you, too, Janet. You and Herbert both helped out a stranger—lucky me!—and for that I will be eternally grateful.