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Drafts of this book have passed before several eyes. The first set of peepers belongs to my wife, Lisa. She has an eye (the left one, I think) for good stories. Her right eye is that of a teacher. This book benefited from her unique binocular vision. Add to this the fact that she has a physiological inability to lie and I received the unvarnished truth from multiple directions. She doesn’t let me get away with anything. I am grateful for my sons, Max and Jack. A few seconds wrapped in their arms or listening to them giggle at a silly joke was always enough to replenish me when my energies were ebbing. I am also delighted to present their first published drawings throughout Chapter 6. In the first panel, Max designed Wrinkle’s look for the story and Jack gave us the naughty, naughty Mr. Sun. In the last panel on page 74, Jack drew me and Max drew Lisa. They are uncanny likenesses. Laura White edited everything I wrote and drew. For free. It is a debt I can never repay, but I will continue to try. As a trained biologist and teacher (and master grammarian-is that a word, Laura?), she patiently corrected the same stupid grammatical errors over and over again and held my feet to the fire when 1 neglected the nuances and complexities of certain biological principles. Her husband Jamie let me know when jokes and images worked and helped me with the physics. I feel very fortunate to have friends so willing to do so much for nothing more in return than an occasional game of euchre. Thanks to the indefatigable Daryn Guarino at Active Synapse Comics for his tireless promotion of my books. He is a business juggernaut and it is because of his efforts that my books have found an audience. His unwavering support and encouragement have made it possible for me to make comics and I can never thank him enough. If you noticed the wonderful colors on the cover of this book, you can join me in thanking Troy Cummings. It has been a delight to get to know him during my sabbatical and I’m glad I could enlist his services now, because it won’t be long before he will be rich, famous and in demand. I also want to thank my invisible collaborator on this project, KB Boomer. Optical Allusions is an educational experiment and KB is the statistician who will be testing its effectiveness in the classroom. It has been fun working with her and I am crossing my fingers about the results. And, of course, thanks go to Chris, John, Adam and Denny at the incomparable Comics Swap in State College, PA. I am grateful to several friends and fellow comic book creators for their comments on the Wrinkles story. Jim Ottaviani’s assistance was invaluable. He caught important things I missed, asked the questions about things I had hoped no one would notice and graciously provided technical guidance as I prepared this book. John Kerschbaum provided comedic inspiration, guidance in helping me navigate tricky storytelling terrain and a steady supply of pictures of his new baby, Norah, to lift my spirits when things got tedious. Zander Cannon said something so inspirational early on that it stuck in my mind the entire time I as working on this book. Kurt Busiek provided encouragement, helpful storytelling hints and mythological insights. My academic friends and colleagues have offered support, suggestions, critiques and insight into the science and pedagogy of this book. I benefited greatly from the advice of Mike Boyle, Kevin Kinney, Randy Bennet, Craig Nelson, Victor DeCarlo, Alex Komives, Glenn Branch, Dana Dudle, Jim and Belle Tuten, Bill White, David Hsiung, and Richard and Memory Hark. This book was started at my home institution Juniata College and completed while on sabbatical at DePauw University. I am deeply grateful for the support of my Provost at Juniata, Jim Lakso, the chair of the Biology Department, Jill Keeney, and Juniata College’s President, Tom Kepple. I am also grateful for Susan Pierotti’s help with the copier (among other things) and for Chris Walls’ help ordering books. They have all provided a place to work that exceeds all of my expectations. I am also grateful to the tireless Jon Wall, Juniata’s Director of Public Relations, for his efforts to promote my work. At DePauw, I am indebted to Provost Neal Abraham for providing the sabbatical opportunity and President Robert Bottoms for letting me come back (after a number of... unflattering cartoons I did as an undergraduate). I am also thankful to Jane Griswold, Tavia Pigg, Wade Hazel, Bonnie Bryant, Mary Gardner and Jim Benedix for their help getting the sabbatical set-up and getting my family and I settled in Greencastle. This work was supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation. My gratitude goes to Jeanne Small at the NSF for encouraging me to submit the grant proposal and Juniata’s Grants Officer, Mike Keating, for helping me to hit deadlines and coordinate the myriad pieces that must be assembled for a grant submission. Additionally, I am grateful to my NSF Program Officers Nancy Pelaez, Nancy Pruitt and Terry Woodlin for their help in securing funding and navigating the bureaucracy. Thanks to Juniata’s John Alfano for managing the budget. Finally, I offer a special thanks to Tonia Lawson, Michelle Jeffers, Tim Scarbrough and Mike Goodale and the other folks at Malloy Printing. They are wonderful to work with and have made the process of putting this book much easier.
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