The Causal Angel

Acknowledgements

It has been a long journey, and it would not have even started without two people: Simon Spanton at Gollancz, and my agent John Jarrold. So many thanks to them for their trust, advice and companionship along the way. I am looking forward to travelling on to new lands with them, beyond those of the Quantum Thief books.

Deep heartfelt thanks also go to:

All you readers who decided to come along and stick with it – there are more of you than I ever dared to imagine!

All those who provided feedback on the early drafts of this book, in particular Sam Halliday, Mark Harding, Esa Hilli, Lauri Lovén, Kathryn Myronuk, Ramez Naam, Phil Raines, Brad Templeton, Stuart Wallace, as well as the usual Writers’ Bloc suspects: Halsted M. Bernard, Morag Edward, Andrew Ferguson, Bram Gieben, Gavin Inglis, Helen Jackson, Jane McKie, Andrew Wilson and Kirsti Wishart. Also thanks to Antti Autio for going above and beyond his translating duties and asking all the right questions.

Hugh Hancock, Martin Page and Charlie Stross for all those creativity-enhancing espressos.

My fellow GSP13 students at the Singularity University for injecting some exponential weirdness into the writing process – especially the amazing HelixNano team: Carina, Geoffrey and Kat.

The sadly absent Iain Banks, with a quiet toast, for showing me and an entire generation of writers the way.

My parents for continuing to show me what courage means.

And finally Zuzana, who appeared one Halloween night five years ago, just as the last words of The Quantum Thief were being written, and changed everything.

— Hannu Rajaniemi

In Edinburgh, 2008–2014.