A sudden gust stripped the last of the leaves from one crooked tree.
I saw with razor’s-edge clarity, so plainly that I laughed out loud from the Disney Movie obviousness of it: The greatest power comes from love, from knowing who you are and standing proudly in it.
In the hospital, and at the rehab center, I used to imagine Better was a place you could get to. A moment when I would look around and see that Everything Was Fine. But that’s not how this works. Being better isn’t a battle you fight and win. Feeling okay is a war, one that lasts your whole life, and the only way to win is to keep on fighting.
“Hungry, girl?” I asked, and held out a handful of french fries.
Her teeth brushed my palm when she snatched them. She could have taken my hand off.
“I’m sorry I got so many of your brothers and sisters killed,” I whispered.
Something thrummed in my veins, in my stomach. It wasn’t hunger—it wasn’t an ungodly destructive superpower rooted in violence—but it was close. I was still that glorious monster that had leveled my town. I still saw how the world worked, understood the systems the powerful used to hurt the powerless. I could change the world.
The pig grunted, looked me in the eye.
“Does that mean you forgive me?”
I ate a couple of the french fries and poured the rest out on the ground for the pig. We chewed together. It was true that a whole lot of pigs were dead because of me, but if it wasn’t for me they would all be dead by now—or stuck behind bars, waiting to be butchered. Now, at least, some of them had a chance.
I looked up through the cage of bare branches. Any day now, the trees would break into blossom. The cold edge to the wind would fall away. Life would burst forth. My mom had found a good job. My sister would write brilliant songs. I would go to college, see the world, find my tribe, do something awesome. Burn all the bad shit to the ground. Build something beautiful.
Overhead, without any fuss, the stars were coming out.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I’ve got a lot to acknowledge. Here’s the first thing: When I was fifteen, I had an eating disorder. No one diagnosed me, not even when I hadn’t eaten for days and was in so much stomach pain that my mom took me to the emergency room at two in the morning (just like Matt!), because lots of people don’t think boys can even get eating disorders. One of the many reasons I wrote this book was because boys are damaged and distorted by the same terrible body-image issues and expectations as girls, and we all need to realize how full of shit that is, and how awesome we are no matter what we look like.
The most important acknowledgment is this one: books have big families. Here are the people who helped birth this one:
Seth Fishman, for being a goddamn genius rock-star agent who took a chance on something completely batshit crazy.
Kristen Pettit, who I already knew was brilliant, but until we rolled up our sleeves and took scalpel and chainsaw to this book, I didn’t truly understand how much a great editor is responsible for a book turning out halfway awesome. Thank you for turning this hot mess into something a little hotter and a lot less messy. And thank you to Elizabeth Lynch for rad flap copy and general editorial magnificence.
John Joseph Adams, for publishing my stories when no one else would. And including them in amazing anthologies. And introducing me to Seth. And being just generally a magnificent specimen. Basically, whatever career I have is thanks to you . . . so . . . yeah.
Holly Black and Cassandra Clare, for being the best YA teachers a writer could ever hope to have.
Jacqueline Woodson, for talking me through some tough decisions, and just generally providing the kind of incredible affirmation that I sorely needed through some rough times.
Beta readers Eliza Blair, Richard Bowes, Sadie Bruce, E. G. Cosh, Pratima Cranse, Kris Dikeman, Lara Elena Donnelly, Eric Esser, Barry Goldblatt, Alaya Dawn Johnson, Chris Kammerud, Matthew Kressel, Carmen Maria Machado, E. C. Meyers, and Luke Pebler all caught tons of horrific mistakes, and, I’m sure, numerous offensive asides. Any problems this book still has are in spite of them.
My siblings in the Clarion class of 2012, who made me into something halfway awesome. My comrades in the Altered Fluid writer’s group, who made me into something even closer to awesome.
The Kiefer-Osts, whose lakeside weekends provided me with remembered warmth on many a bleak cold night. My Picture the Homeless family, especially Lynn Lewis & Jean Rice & Tyletha Samuels & Nikita Price & Arvernetta Henry & DeBoRah Dickerson, for teaching me so much about strength and survival and dignity in the face of horrific oppression. Maria Dahvana Headley isn’t just one of our best short story writers—she is a paragon of generosity and awesomeness. Kalyani Sanchez, Kathy Rodriguez, Patricia Thomas, R. F. I. Porto, Saffie Kallon, Tim Fite, Trinidad M. Pe?a, and Walead Esmail were my cheering squad for the years when I was sorely in need of one.
My sister, Sarah Talent, BFF and Number One Fan and Staunchest Ally.
My mother, Deborah Miller, has been my Writer Hero since I was thirteen, when she showed me how to do a cover letter and a self-addressed stamped envelope. She was publishing dark and edgy brilliant stories when I was still a puppy, and her words have inspired me my whole life. But after coming through an unspeakably rough year, surviving some shit I could never have survived, she’s now my Life Hero, as well.
This is my debut novel, but it’s also my seventh novel. Every single one of its predecessors died a long, slow, painful death that made me generally miserable and probably pretty awful. My husband, Juancy Rodriguez, had my back through all of it, and through a whole lot of other shit, and without his unflinching love and support and affirmation (and stern admonishments), I probably wouldn’t have been able to keep picking myself up to start again. To say nothing of the fact that he turned me on to so much of the art that is most important to me—Octavia Butler, Battlestar Galactica, and Avatar: The Last Airbender, to name a few—my storytelling chops would still be stunted and inadequate without them.
And finally, my father, Hyman P. Miller, who spent seven years battling cancer. Twenty-four hours before he passed away, we accepted HarperCollins’s offer to publish The Art of Starving. So pretty much the best thing in my life and the worst thing happened right next to each other. This book is for him, for the lifetime of love and acceptance he gave me, which is how I got through my own miserable high school experience, and for the superpower of self-acceptance.