Unlike The Scar Boys, Scar Girl was written on a deadline. This means that there were far fewer early readers. Thank you to my friend and fellow writer Nadine Vassallo and to my wonderful agent Sandra Bond for their feedback.
The parts of the book that deal with Johnny’s amputation were informed by a series of conversations with my friend Pat Logan, a prostheticist. When Pat was in his early twenties, he lost his leg in a freak ATV accident. Rather than letting that incident define his life in a negative way, Pat made it define his life in a positive way. He now spends his time and industry in the service of other amputees, and he’s one of my heroes. His insight and knowledge allowed me to make Johnny’s experience more authentic, and I thank him.
As I did in The Scar Boys, I thank my former Woofing Cookies bandmates for their friendship and for our shared experience, and for allowing me to use the lyrics to “Johnny’s Dead”—a song we all cowrote in the 1980s—at the end of the book.
A huge thank-you to booksellers and librarians everywhere for embracing The Scar Boys. Without that support, this book would not exist.
Thanks to my sons, Charlie and Luke, for putting up with Dad’s insane travel schedule in support of his dream to be a writer, and a massive, never-ending, all encompassing thanks to Kristen Gilligan, my wife and partner in all crimes and misdemeanors, for the same. In addition to a lot of weekends watching our kids on her own, Kristen is always my first reader, one of my best editors, and, you know, I love her.
And of course, thanks to my extended network of family and friends for supporting me as you do. I’m one lucky dude.