The Boy Kings

grateful to my editor, Alessandra Bastagli, for her great eye, judgment, and editorial vision; and to Melissa Flashman, for being a dauntless, loyal agent and friend.
    I would also like to thank all of the friends, artists, writers, and places, many but not all of whom are mentioned in this book, from whom I have drawn inspiration and with whom I have felt connected in the course of my adventures. I am especially grateful to Dana Armstrong for her friendship, to Ashley Nebelsieck for her wit, to Owen for being my true bro, toDanish Aziz for listening, to Thrax for being there even when he wasn’t there, to California for always shimmering off somewhere in the distance, to Baltimore for being my school of hard knocks, to Frank Ocean for being my 2011 muse when I needed one, and to Winter 2012 Marfa for all of its art and light.