To my mum, Jillian, thank you for so enthusiastically supporting every creative whim and career dream I’ve ever had and for always encouraging me to pursue what lights me up, rather than what seems sensible. Thank you for reading many versions of this book and for your pragmatic, detailed feedback. I’m so grateful to have grown up with such a wonderful example of what it means to be a curious, independent, resourceful, and successful woman—I love you.
To Jeremy, thank you for entertaining me for hours when we were kids by crafting elaborate imaginary worlds for our toys—my first foray into storytelling—and for all of your excellent feedback on this book. I’m so fortunate to have such a wonderful big brother. Thank you also to Kirsten, Hugo, Amélie, and Reuben for your love and support throughout this journey.
To all the aunts, uncles, grandparents and extended family who stepped in to help raise us, thank you for instilling us with an insatiable sense of adventure, curiosity, imagination, and love for storytelling, and for making us feel cherished.
To Jamie Farnsworth Finn, Trisha Ray, and Jesse Steinbach, thank you for reading early versions of the book and for your immensely helpful notes and relentless cheerleading along the way. To Claudia Cosgrove and Cara O’Callaghan, thank you for graciously entertaining my cross-continental texts containing odd medical questions and hypotheticals. To Danielle Katvan, thank you for sharing your experiences of growing up in New York City. To Stephanie Ogé, Anna Caradeuc, Shannon Sharpe, and Carilyn Garrett, thank you for your infinite enthusiasm and encouragement.
To Emma Brodie, KJ Dell’Antonia, Annabel Monaghan, Ruth Hogan, Meredith Westgate, and everyone who took the time to read or blurb early copies of the book, I deeply appreciate your support and generous words. Thank you also to Georgia Clark, Rosalind McClintock, and Allison Warren for so generously sharing your publishing industry knowledge.
To Christine Arroyo, Meredith Craig De Pietro, Tara Crowl, Dani Fankhauser, Lydia Gidwitz, Suzanne Martinez, Eva Munz, Irina Patkanian, Nayomi Reghay, Liana Rodriguez, Natalia Sandoval, and Kabira Stokes—thank you for responding so positively on the first day I joined the writing group and announced I was trying to write “a book about death that’s fun and uplifting.” Your support and perceptive feedback in those very early stages helped me believe it might actually work. I can’t wait to see your novels alongside mine on the shelves one day.
To Joe Veltre, Olivia Johnson, and the team at The Gersh Agency, thank you for your dedication to helping Clover reach the screen. Thank you also to all the foreign literary co-agents: Ania Walczak and Beata Glińska at Anna Jarota Agency, Mira Droumeva at Andrew Nurnberg Associates, Vanessa Maus at Berla & Griffini, Sophie Langlais at Books and More Agency, Duran Kim at Duran Kim Agency, Evangelia Avloniti at Ersilia Literary Agency, Clare Chi at The Grayhawk Agency, Kristin Olson at Kristin Olson Literary Agency, Antonia Girmacea at Livia Stoia Literary Agency, Rik Kleuver at Sebes & Bisseling, and Miguel Sader at Villas-Boas & Moss Literary Agency.
To Imani Williams, thank you for your attentive sensitivity reading and immensely helpful feedback.
To Chafin Elliot and Dorothy Hinz, thank you for your company, your wisdom, and your stories. To the staff and residents of the Fray Rodrigo de La Cruz nursing home in Antigua, Guatemala, thank you for teaching me so much about helping people to age with dignity.
To Jeanne Denney, thank you for so generously sharing your insights in what it means to walk beside someone as they journey toward death and how to help them do that with peace and grace.
To all those who have shared their own experiences with death and the dying, via books, podcasts, and webinars, especially Megan Devine, Atul Gawande, Michael Hebb, Scott Macklin, Bronnie Ware, and Karen M. Wyatt—thank you for making conversations around death easier. Thank you also to the folks at Doula Givers, Doula Program, Carter Burden Center for Aging, and Citymeals on Wheels in New York for your excellent, much-needed work. And to the New York Public Library, the Open Center, the New York Society for Ethical Culture, and all those who open their spaces to death cafés and discussions.
To Jane Birkin, who shared her wisdom to be “cautiously reckless” with me years ago when I interviewed her for a magazine. It has guided me ever since and became Claudia’s wisdom in this book.
To Tamara Salem, thank you for your golden friendship and for all the adventures we got to enjoy together—though you’ll never travel by my side again, you’ll always be in my heart.
To Carl Lindgren, it’s ironic that so much of what you taught me exists in this book and yet you’ll never get to read it, therein proving the very point of it: we often lose the people we care about much sooner than we expect to, so we should cherish them while we can. I wouldn’t be where I am had you not given me a chance all those years ago and continued to believe in me. Thank you for teaching me to write with my heart instead of my head; thank you for everything.
And finally, lovely reader, thank you for dedicating a portion of your precious hours on this earth to reading my book. I hope you’ve found your own version of living a beautiful life.
About the Author
MIKKI BRAMMER is an Australian writer based in New York City, by way of France and Spain. She writes about architecture, art, and design for publications such as Architectural Digest, Dwell, and ELLE Decor. The Collected Regrets of Clover is her debut novel. You can sign up for email updates here.
You can find her on Instagram and Twitter @mikkibrammer.