Thornwood by Leah Cypess (read after .txt) 📕

Luckily, Darella—that’s one of my sister’s ladies-in-waiting—has turned out to be a genius at organization. She does all the birthday parties, arranges the court minstrel’s “reunion tours,” and handles the complaints from the people who are disappointed by the royal wizard’s magic show. In return, I smooth things over when my parents are rude to “the commoners” (it’s taking them a while to adjust).

On top of all that, I have to deal with this thing called “school,” which…well, I’m not even going to get into that. Let’s just say that sometimes, I wish I were still trapped in the castle.

Point is, I’m busy. And when I do have time to sit down and write, my letters to Edwin always seem to take priority. They’re important: he needs someone to keep him grounded, now that he goes to that fancy school for geniuses.

He (mostly) hasn’t let the school go to his head. And he hasn’t forgotten who his friends are, either. Last time he came home, he bought me a parakeet. Chirpy doesn’t sing, but he’s a beautiful shade of light green, and he’s really, really smart. My friends from school (okay, fine, school isn’t all bad) are always begging me to bring him to class and let him be the class pet. We’ll see.

All of this is to explain why it’s taken me so long to write this story down.

Rosalin doesn’t understand why I’ve bothered. She says it will just be one of dozens of books, and nobody will be able to tell that it’s the truth.

She’s probably right. But I have no plan to publish this account. Like I said, there are plenty of others. And there will be more; I’m told that the kennel boy and two of the ladies-in-waiting are busy writing their own.

And in the end, does it really matter who they tell the story about?

Rosalin has always known she was the center of a tale. To her, that was what made her special. I don’t need that. I can let her have her story.

Well. Unless she goes back on her promise to never criticize my hair again.

In that case, I’m going to tell the whole world.

Acknowledgments

So much gratitude!

To Diana Peterfreund, for reasons too numerous to list.

To Jodi Meadows, for teaching me and my daughter how to spin. Thank you for all your helpful comments, both spinning-related and plot-related. Any SWSOs (Spinning Wheel–Shaped Objects) that remain in this book are entirely the fault of the author.

To Stephanie Burgis, for insightful critiques, and for calm answers to unnecessarily panicked emails.

To my invaluable critique partners: Tova Suslovich, Christine Amsden, Elizabeth Lazear, Sima Braunstein, Michael Greenhut, Sol Kim Bentley, Nancy Lambert, Merrie Haskell, Victoria Rothenberg, Aryeh Breitstein, Seth Z. Herman, Erin Cashman (it’s been a long time in the trenches together!), and Day al-Mohammed (both for your helpful critiques and for inviting me to the writing session during which I found myself, to my surprise, finishing the book).

To my even more invaluable young readers: my daughters, Shoshana and Hadassah, for allowing me to use them as test-drivers for this book (and for help with kingdom names); Shlomo Sheril; and Bella Kotek.

To my husband, Aaron, for everything and for always.

To my parents, Jacob and Esther Suslovich, and my in-laws, Ray and Sandy Cypess.

To my agent extraordinaire, Andrea Somberg, for this book and for all the other books.

To Wendy Loggia, for thinking this book was great when she first saw it, and then helping me make it actually great.

To Ali Romig, for coming in just in time to make a difference. I’m so glad I get to work with you!

To Carol Ly and Kelsey Eng. As I’m writing this, I haven’t even seen the final version of the cover yet, but I can say with absolute confidence that I’m going to love it. I keep the preliminary sketches on my phone so I can glance at them while I revise.

To all the incredible people at Delacorte Press, including Colleen Fellingham, Tamar Schwartz, and everyone else I haven’t met yet—I’m looking forward to when I do! I’m excited to be part of your team.

And last but not least, to the staff at the Kosher Pastry Oven, where at least 50 percent of this book was written. I’m glad to finally have an answer to “So, when is that book you’re working on going to get published?”

About the Author

Leah Cypess is the author of four YA novels: Mistwood, Nightspell, Death Sworn, and Death Marked. Both Mistwood and Death Sworn were on the Kirkus Reviews Best Books for Teens list, and Death Sworn was a Teen Vogue Most Exciting YA Book of the Year. She lives in Silver Spring, Maryland. Thornwood is her middle-grade debut.

leahcypess.com

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