To my parents, Arvind Ambalal Patel and Pushpa Arvind Patel, who instilled a love of reading and learning in me from an early age and taught me to never give up. To my sister, Amy, who pushes me to do better, be better, and climb higher.
To my friends who have been on this journey with me for decades, read early drafts of bad writing, and still believed I would get here one day: Kathleen Conlon, Stephanie Crane, Laura Holton （who is also real-life Wally’s human）， Sean Rudd, Colleen Skeuse, Elizabeth McDonough, Patrick Gallagher, and Sonal Patel.
To Cindy Lynch, who told me to not get in my own way and believed I would be an author one day. I did it, Cindy!
To my writing friends, for being in the trenches, celebrating success, commiserating, gossiping, and all the things in between: Jennifer Hallock, Jen Doyle, Caroline Linden, Farah Heron, Nisha Sharma, Falguni Kothari, Sonali Dev, Annika Sharma, Alisha Rai, Suleena Bibra, Kishan Paul, Sophia Singh Sasson, Sona Charaipotra, Sulekha Snyder, and Sarah Cassell （who gets credit for this title）。
To my extended family of aunts, uncles, and cousins as well as my friends in Boston, Spokane, London, New York, and New Jersey. You’ve heard me talking about this at one point or another, and well, here we are.
To Christa Desir for seeing the potential in my raw manuscripts and helping me become a better writer.
To my editors, Megha Parekh and Jenna Free, who push me to keep growing as a writer.
To my agent, Sarah Younger, who has this unique ability to offer unyielding support while always speaking the truth. I can’t imagine being here without you.
To the team at Lake Union Publishing: S. B. Kleinman, Haley Swan, Jim Poling, Nicole Burns-Ascue, and Kellie Osborne.
Finally, Holly Pickett, whose photojournalism and bravery taught me perseverance and a deep belief in telling the stories that need to be told. This is for everyone who is fighting for their dreams: don’t stop practicing, be patient （to a degree）， and keep going, especially when traveling against the current.