What do the following authors have in common? (The term author is used exceptionally loosely.)

James Agee, Martin Amis, Susan B. Anthony, Nicholson Baker, Wendell Berry, Sergey Brin, James Dickey, Franklin W. Dixon, Michael Dukakis, Barbara Ehrenreich, Eminem, James Frey, William Gibson, Gilbert & Sullivan, Robert Heinlein, Jessica Helfand, Billy Idol, Kafka, Gordon Lightfoot, Michael Martone, Melville, Walter Mondale, my dentist who shall not be named, Tim O’Brien, Flannery O’Connor, Larry Page, Robert Pinsky, Richard Powers, Adrienne Rich, Eero Saarinen, Eliel Saarinen, Ridley Scott, Bruce Sterling, Jules Verne, and Brad Vice.

The answer lies within Neck Deep. This is one of many indices to the contents of the book, an index certainly of my reading, and to an extent of my obsessions.

Writers who show up here in shadows, in gaseous form, in echo: Charles Baxter, Jenny Boully, John D'Agata, Thalia Field, Sandy Huss, Carole Maso, John McPhee, Chelsey Minnis, and no one whose names start with N or anything after that.