Ex-Heroes

Acknowledgments

It still amazes me that a few random conversations could somehow combine with a handful of superheroes I made up in grade school to create a novel in just a few months. Let alone a novel someone else would want to read. Of course, it could not have happened so fast without some help from a few people. With that in mind, allow me to give some very heartfelt thanks …

To Ilya, who figured out how to defend a movie studio from the undead and gave me more information on how to do it than I could ever use in one book.

To Doug, who loaned me his own childhood creation, the Awesome Ape.

To the owners, staff, and players of a small world known as M’Dhoria. You wouldn’t be reading this if that world still existed, so I tried to make it live a little here.

To Jen, Larry, Gillian, and Marcus, who read early drafts of this novel, offered some thoughts, and convinced me I wasn’t entirely wasting my time. Double that thanks for David, who deserves to be paid far more than the few drinks I get to buy him when we’re in the same city.

To my mom, Sally, who read countless pages of bad sci-fi, fantasy, and Star Wars fanfic (long before such a term existed) and yet still always gave me the encouragement to keep at it. Even when it horrified her on many levels.

And finally to Colleen, the wonderful love of my life, who is always there to be a sounding board, a critic, a line editor, or to deliver either reassurances or a swift kick (depending on what the given day calls for). —P.C. Los Angeles, January 16, 2009