Thank you to Pippa Masson for your faith in me, your honesty and warmth, and for always being in my corner. I am so very lucky to have you as my agent, along with the rest of the brilliant team at Curtis Brown Australia. Thank you to Gordon Wise and Kate Cooper and the team at Curtis Brown UK. Your support and enthusiasm are so appreciated, and I am honoured to have representation with you. To Dan Lazar at Writers House, thank you for your kind, considerate suggestions, and for your positive attitude. To Jerry Kalajian at Intellectual Property Group, thank you for your patience and passion.
To Cate Paterson, for your calm and steady encouragement, thank you. It is a privilege to be published with Picador. Thank you to Mathilda Imlah for being so generous with your time and genius, even when you really had much better and more important things to do. Thank you to Ali Lavau, superstar, for your considered edit. Thank you to Tracey Cheetham (deadset legend), Danielle Walker, and all the incredible people at Pan Macmillan Australia for the passion you bring, and the myriad ways you have helped this book on its way. I’d give you all a hug if I could.
To Sophie Jonathan, thank you for knowing when to dig deeper, and for your superb, intelligent mind. Thank you to Kate Green and the wonderful team at Picador UK for loving books the way you do. I am eternally thrilled to be one of your authors.
To Elder Mandy Brown, I am deeply grateful for your time, insights, and conversation. Thank you for speaking with me and sharing your knowledge. Our chats had a profound impact on me.
Thank you to Anni Luur Fox for your stories about Hahndorf and enthusiasm for its history. Thank you to Annette Humphries for all of your kind assistance.
To Kristie Hedley, thank you for so generously supporting the #authorsforfireys charitable auction in early 2020. (I hope you forgive me for using the Latin origin of your name.)
Thank you to Margot McGovern and Lisa Bennett for reassuring me that a Lutheran ghost was a good idea, and for all our writers’ coven nights. To my friends who continue to get in touch with me even when I don’t reply for weeks, and who somehow still forgive me for disappearing, thank you. Thank you to Gail and David for your support. Thank you to Pam, Alan, Briony and Owen for your unconditional love and for reminding me that I always get there eventually.
To my children (who were born during the writing of this book), I love you both so much. Anouk, thank you for every sweet interruption, every picture drawn on my research papers. Rory, thank you for your ready laugh, and for all the snuggles.
And finally, thank you to Heidi, my love. Thank you for the pram chats, the picnic lunches on the floor, wrangling children so I could have another hour to write. But most of all, thank you for your belief in me and this story. Devotion is for you.
About the Author
Hannah Kent’s first novel, Burial Rites, has been translated into over thirty languages and was shortlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction, the Guardian First Book Award and the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. In Australia it won the ABIA Literary Fiction Book of the Year and the Indie Awards Debut Fiction Book of the Year, amongst others. Her second novel, The Good People, was also been translated into many languages and shortlisted for the Walter Scott Prize. Devotion is her third novel.