A Golden Web
Page 16
Jan Gurley, M.D., has provided this writer with untold riches. She gave me a crash course in the anatomy of the coronary-pulmonary circulatory system (sketched on a series of napkins in one of Berkeley’s great Indian restaurants). She helped me understand the physiology of what leads up to and follows administration of the Heimlich maneuver. And, best of all, she has allowed me to be honorary auntie to her two wildly talented teenage daughters—Emilia Gurley and Grace Linderholm, who were the novel’s earliest readers and generously served as my consultants from first chapters to final draft. Owen Linderholm has expanded both my high-tech and culinary horizons.
John Quick once again held down the fort and looked after the interests of our beloved son while I was off doing my research. Joolian Quick, said son, never ceases to amaze me with his creative spirit, his musical talent, and the power of his smile to light up my world.
Liz and Federico Minoli not only gave me the key to the in-law apartment attached to their magnificent flat in Bologna but unlocked the social heart of the city for me as well. I am more grateful than I can say for the music, the opportunities to wear a pretty dress, and the respite from my labors provided by their friendship.
Liz Stonehill stepped forward with an unparalleled act of generosity when the wolf was at my door in 2007, allowing me to keep devoting my time and energy to Alessandra.
Manuela Teatini, a writer and journalist based in Bologna, first interviewed me and then entered fully into my quest. I am enormously grateful for her hospitality as well as her insistence on driving me to Persiceto, where I struck bibliographic gold.
Maria van Beuren, chatelaine of Toad Hall—a beautiful-beyond-belief, invitation-only writers’ retreat in New Hampshire—gave me the warmest welcome and the most magically fun and restorative week of brilliance and hilarity I’ve ever had in my lifetime. No one knew it when we were born, but Maria is—and will be forever more—my beloved sister.
Roberto Condello’s perfect small hotel at the southern edge of Bologna’s historic center, the Hotel Porta San Mamolo, was the center of everything for me—friendship, camaraderie, the best cappuccino, and kindness above and beyond what any traveler can reasonably expect. I will always feel grateful to Roberto and the San Mamolo’s beautiful manager, Irena Lorja, for treating me to their warmhearted hospitality.
Rosemary Brosnan, my brilliant, sweet, and slyly relentless editor at Harper, made this novel so much better than it would have been without her ministrations. She got the very best out of me—which is what a great editor does, is it not? Rosemary, you rock!
Wayne Roden, violist with the San Francisco Symphony, vigneron, Italophile, and—magically now—my fiancé, entered my life just on time to take his well-deserved place in these acknowledgments. I created Otto—and then Wayne came along to prove that fairy tales do come true.
You’ll find a detailed glossary, including medieval and Latin terms, at www.agoldenweb.com.
About the Author
Writer and poet Barbara Quick is the author of the novels VIVALDI’S VIRGINS and NORTHERN EDGE, winner of the Discover Prize. A GOLDEN WEB is her first book for teen readers. An avid traveler and student of other languages, she has run an international boardinghouse; written everything from self-help books to humor columns to grant requests for disadvantaged children; and done whatever jobs she needed to do—from landscape gardening to catering to editing—to allow her to continue writing. She lives with her teenage son, Julian, in the San Francisco Bay Area, where she takes frequent classes and occasionally performs with a Brazilian dance troupe.
You can visit Barbara online at www.barbaraquick.com
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Credits
Jacket art © 2010 by Juliana Kolesova
Jacket design by Joel Tippie
Copyright
A GOLDEN WEB. Copyright © 2010 by Barbara Quick. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Quick, Barbara.
A golden web / Barbara Quick.—1st ed.
p. cm.
Summary: In fourteenth-century Bologna, Alessandra Giliani, a brilliant young girl, defies convention and risks death in order to attend medical school at the university so that she can study anatomy.
ISBN 978-0-06-144887-4 (trade bdg.)
1. Giliani, Alessandra, 1307-1326—Juvenile fiction. [1. Giliani, Alessandra, 1307–1326—Fiction. 2. Sex role—Fiction. 3. Anatomy—Fiction. 4. Bologna (Italy)—History—Middle Ages, 600–1500—Fiction. 5. Italy—History—1268–1492—Fiction.] I. Title.
PZ7.Q3183Go 2010 2009014265
[Fic]—dc22 CIP
AC
EPub Edition © February 2010 ISBN: 978-0-06-199194-3
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
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