Goodbye Stranger (25 page)

But it wasn’t like that. Kissing Sherm was like saying “And…and…and…”

Kissing Sherm didn’t feel anything like the end.

ENORMOUS THANKS

to my generous and inexhaustible readers: Daphne Benedis-Grab, Judy Blundell, Kristin Cashore, Donna Freitas, Caroline Gertler, Deborah Heiligman, Randi Kish, Eli and Jack O’Brien, Deborah Stead, and Cleo Watson.

to ab-fab editor Wendy Lamb, assistant editor Dana Carey, and their thoughful readers: Sarah Eckstein, Teria Jennings, and Hannah Weverka.

to the stunning Random House team, including John Adamo, Dominique Cimina, Colleen Fellingham, Kate Gartner, Judith Haut, Casey Lloyd, Alison Kolani, Barbara Marcus, Adrienne Waintraub, and Isabel Warren-Lynch.

to my shining agent, Faye Bender.

to my friends and my family,

who show me every day what love really means.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Rebecca Stead is the author of three previous books for children.
When You Reach Me
, a
New York Times
bestseller, won the Newbery Medal and the
Boston Globe–Horn Book
Award for Fiction.
Liar & Spy
, also a bestseller, was named a notable book by the
New York Times Book Review
and won the
Guardian
Prize for Children’s Fiction. Her first novel,
First Light,
was named a Best Book for Teens by the New York Public Library. Rebecca lives in New York City with her family.