Acknowledgments

 

Acknowledgments

I learned about writing from editors Jane Rosenbloom, Judy Sternlight, Stefan Merrill Block,

and Phil Ehrenkranz. And had the confidence to persist thanks to encouragement from many

friends and readers but especially Geraldine Brooks¹, Susanne Page, Nancy Worssam, Kay

Rodriguez, Sheela Lampieti, Barbara Lucas, Tony Horwitz, and my family, David Tiller and

Ana Patel, who gave thoughtful critiques. I’m especially grateful to Bowman Cutter, who read

the manuscript nine times and was my patient sounding board and supporter through an eight-

year process. I’m also grateful to book agent Jacques de Spoelberch for his faith in my writing,

and to She Writes Press for publishing in July 2022 the first iteration of this novel, Long

Shadows. My daughter, Anne Tiller, designed the award-winning cover which captured its mood

so well. Thanks also go to union Square & Co., for publishing this revised edition. Thank you to

my union Square & Co. editor Barbara Berger, and especially publisher Emily Meehan and

Barnes & Noble CEO James Daunt², who believed the novel deserves a larger audience. They

have reissued the book as The Last of What I Am, with a cover designed by talented cover

creative director Jo Obarowski.

Without the extraordinary database and website “The Valley of the Shadow” created by

eminent³ American historian Dr. Edward Ayers and his award-winning books In the Presence of

Mine Enemies: The Civil War in the Heart of America 1859– 1864 and The Thin Light of

Freedom: Emancipation⁴ in the Heart of America, I could never have found such detailed⁵

material about the Civil War in Virginia. Those sources, and Drew Gilpin Faust’s book This

Republic of Suffering: Death and the American Civil War, were the foundation for two years of

research. My novel is as historically accurate as I knew to make it, with one exception. The

Gatling gun, the first American rapid firing weapon, was first used in 1864 during the Siege of

Petersburg, not a year earlier as my story states.

1 brooks   

n.小溪( brook的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Brooks gave the business when Haas caught him with his watch. 哈斯抓到偷他的手表的布鲁克斯时，狠狠地揍了他一顿。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Ade and Brooks exchanged blows yesterday and they were severely punished today. 艾德和布鲁克斯昨天打起来了，今天他们受到严厉的惩罚。 来自《简明英汉词典》

2 daunt   

vt.使胆怯，使气馁

参考例句：

• Danger did not daunt the hero.危险并没有吓倒这位英雄。
• Even a greater natural calamity cannot daunt us.再大的自然灾害也压不垮我们。

3 eminent   

adj.显赫的，杰出的，有名的，优良的

参考例句：

• We are expecting the arrival of an eminent scientist.我们正期待一位著名科学家的来访。
• He is an eminent citizen of China.他是一个杰出的中国公民。

4 emancipation   

n.（从束缚、支配下）解放

参考例句：

• We must arouse them to fight for their own emancipation. 我们必须唤起他们为其自身的解放而斗争。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• They rejoiced over their own emancipation. 他们为自己的解放感到欢欣鼓舞。 来自《简明英汉词典》

5 detailed   

adj.详细的，详尽的，极注意细节的，完全的

参考例句：

• He had made a detailed study of the terrain.他对地形作了缜密的研究。
• A detailed list of our publications is available on request.我们的出版物有一份详细的目录备索。