FROM THE AUTHOR

I guess I started writing this book a little after one o'clock in the afternoon on April 8, 1994. I didn't take pen to paper. But that's the day I started writing this story. I was twenty-four years old at the time.

I had been married for a little over two years to my husband. We had a great apartment on the Upper West Side. There were even a few trees on our block, so it was nice for me; I got to see the seasons change.

On this day, I had gotten up early, fixed my husband breakfast, waved him off to work. Then I tidied up the place, drew the shades, and crawled into bed. This was how I spent each day.

"He's dead."
"Who's dead?"
"Cobain."

I have to do this in three-hundred words, so I can't go line for line, but you know how the conversation went. What about Rome? But Frances? Why? My husbund hung up and I turned on MTV. Nothing like a visibly shaken Kurt Loder to make you really feel like shit.

Anyway, soon after Cobain died, I read Anna Karenina and it struck me that despite being born in different centuries and on different continents, Anna and Kurt were very much alike. I know, you're probably rolling your eyes, that's quite a reach honey. But this is part of the problem. Most of the time, even for me, it's easier to write "depression" off, to think of it as just another word for sadness.

Today there are medicines that help. And there are countless worthwhile books that document that journey toward recovery. I think it's fair to tell you, though: this isn't one of them. Readers always ask me if the book is fiction, and yeah, this is fiction. I'm still married. I have two beautiful kids. And I don't spend my days hiding in a dark room. You should see me; I could give Rodin a run for his money with the Play-doh. But who I am today is a long way from who I was when I first started writing. So the feelings in my novel, the fear, the endless self-doubt, well, all that stuff is pretty close to the bone.

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