To our reigning Dragon Queen, the one and only Rachel Denwood. Thank you for believing in Dragon Mountain and seeing something special in it. We are so proud to be published by you and so thrilled to have the opportunity to work with you. It is genuinely an honour to be your first fiction acquisition at Simon & Schuster. Thank you for everything you have put into this book. We are so glad to be on this journey with you at the helm.
Thank you to our amazing editor, Lucy Rogers, who must have magic in her fingertips and a pearl power that gives her the gift of super editing – thank you for helping us make Dragon Mountain the very best book it can be. We love working with you and are so excited for all the adventures to come.
We would also like to thank wonderful Ali Dougal and Jenny Glencross on the editorial team. Jenny, thank you for your support. Ali, we are so excited we get to continue working with you – what joy!
To our copyeditor, Catherine Coe, who is as kind as she is eagle-eyed; we love working with you! Thank you as well to Jane Tait for a top-notch proofread. The small details and fixes made the book shine like gold in a dragon’s hoard.
A dragon-sized thank you to the superstar team behind the cover and the look of the book. Brilliant Jesse Green at Simon & Schuster who came up with the overall concept, the incredibly talented illustrator Petur Antonsson who brought our dragons to life and design genius Tom Sanderson who created the gorgeous lettering and branding for the book.
Just like dragons need wings to fly, a book needs marketing/sales/PR support to soar out into the world, and we couldn’t have asked for a better team to launch Dragon Mountain! Thank you to the whole Simon & Schuster sales and marketing teams, especially sales wizard Laura Hough, marketing extraordinaire Sarah Macmillan, and fabulous publicists Eve Wersocki Morris and Olivia Horrox.
An audiobook brings a book to life in a very special way and we are so happy that readers can listen to the world of Dragon Mountain thanks to Dominic Brendon at Simon & Schuster and our phenomenal narrator, Kevin Shen.
We would also like to thank our US publishing team at Sterling Books, especially editors Christina Pulles, Rachael Stein and Ardi Alspach.
We are very lucky to be part of an incredible author community, both in London and across the globe. This book has had so much support from authors we admire. We are forever grateful to Kiran Millwood Hargrave, Samantha Shannon, Catherine Doyle and Roshani Chokshi for their generous and wonderful quotes. Such a dream come true to have quotes from such brilliant writers. Cat didn’t have much of a choice as she’s soon to literally be family when she marries Katie’s brother, but that doesn’t take away how great the quote is.
Special thank you to our MG writer crew for their cheerleading, excellent company and wonderful books – Kiran Millwood Hargrave, Tom De Freston, Anna James, Kate Rundell, Abi Elphinstone, Cerrie Burnell and Katherine Woodfine. And shout-out to Dhonielle Clayton and Patrice Caldwell across the pond for being excited about this book from the very start. Come visit London again soon.
Thank you to Alwyn Hamilton who gave us the idea for a dragon to hoard buttons, which led to Buttons. Rosi Crawley, Ben O’Donnell, Nina Douglas, Laure Eve, Holly Bourne and Krystal Sutherland all reassured us at various times that we really did have a good idea, and believed in the book, which means the world.
We are tremendously grateful to booksellers around the world for supporting us and our books. Special thank you to Queens Park Books, Chicken and Frog and Waterstones Piccadilly. Holly Davies and Dan Bird, you may no longer run the Waterstones Events but we’ll always be Team Holly and a #DanFan. Thanks for everything.
To the original Hong Kong crew and our own dragon clan – Dyna and Kris, Jeni and Maarten (and Matilde!) – we love you guys.
Jessica and Allen, thank you for always being so excited about our next book. We are so lucky to have you (and Poppy) in our lives.
Thank you to Kevin’s childhood friend Nathan Bell for inspiring the last name ‘Bell’ for Charlotte. And thank you to Katie’s childhood friends Fay and Janou for all the hours and hours (and years) of imaginary games and playtime. We hope that Diego is a dragon fan when he is older and has just as an imaginative childhood as we did.
We finished copyedits on this book in the midst of the 2020 Covid-19 pandemic, so we want to take an opportunity to thank all the healthcare and key workers for keeping us safe and fed in this time, with a special thank you to our friend Dr Thomas Getreu (and shout-out to his two adorable kids, Carson and Cameran).
And finally, to our wonderful family across the globe. Thank you to all the Tsangs, Webbers, Hoppers and Liu’s for their incredible support. We love you all so much. We’d like to especially thank our parents, Rob and Virginia Webber, and Paulus and Louisa Tsang.
Stephanie and Ben, thank you for always being happy to chat dragons with us, and of course for Evie’s epic dragon suit! Cat, thank you not only for the quote but for talking us through various plot points and for your belief in the book. Jack, thank you for the excellent inspiration in the form of D&D games and for excellent dragon feedback. Janie, thank you for all the awesome playlists and gifs and making us laugh. We truly have the best family ever.
To our nephew, Cooper, we love you and hope you enjoy discovering dragons when you are older.
And to our own baby dragon Evie, this book is for you. We started writing it while we were pregnant with you, and now you’re here to celebrate the publication
