Beauty & Dynamite!

Hooray!! It’s time to celebrate! Beauty & Dynamite is now up for preorder!
It will be released on June 1, 2008.
Preorder Beauty & Dynamite from Apex Books here — only $15.95!
Check out this gorgeous cover!

“Alethea Kontis has already more than proven herself as both a fiction writer and editor, but this collection of non-fiction pieces shows her to be an essayist of the first order; funny, angry, insightful, and eloquent, Alethea’s essays are what all non-fiction should be: a feast for the mind and the soul. Beauty & Dynamite , indeed.”

–Five-time Bram Stoker Award winner Gary A. Braunbeck, author of Mr. Hands and Coffin County

“Alethea’s essays are a delight. Warm, witty, and wise, they never fail to bring a smile to my face.”

–Tim Waggoner, author of Pandora Drive and Darkness Wakes

Preorder Beauty & Dynamite from Apex Books here — only $15.95!

Tim and Gary are classy gentlemen, aren’t they? I admire them to pieces, and it made me swoon that they said such nice things about my essays (and were sure to reinforce the fact that they meant it)! And inside Beauty & Dynamite there are even more fabulous people sa ying fabulous things about me (some of them true…and some of them not-so-true).

But that’s not enough. The essays in Beauty & Dynamite are about my wild and crazy and magical and heartbreaking life, to which ALL of you have contributed. You are my inspiration! I want you to be part of the excitement!

So, if you have ever read ANY of my essays — on my blog, or in Apex — and would like to give me your blurb, I would love to have it! Jason has agreed to put them all in a “randomized quote rotator” on the Apex website, so you will be able to see all of them!

Send your blurb to me at [email protected]. (Warning: if it’s more than 100 words, I might edit it.) Be casual! Be funny! Be candid! Be honest! (But be nice…you know the rules about putting bad things out into the world.)

And keep checking back at the Apex Books Company website to see the ! new quot es!

I will be at NY Comic Con in a few weeks — you can find me at Sherrilyn Kenyon’s booth, signing copies of the Dark-Hunter Companion and handing out exclusive bookmarks for Beauty & Dynamite!

For those who haven’t seen them on MySpace, here’s what they say on the back (you might recognize the snippet from “Making Dynamite” in Apex Digest issue #12):

I am Alice, and Beauty & Dynamite is a doorway to my Wonderland.

It is a collage of magic and misery–collected tales of life, love, and one girl’s coming of age in the publishing industry.
Welcome.

Brush off the Looking Glass. Sit back. Have a spot of tea. Move down one and make room for the Doormouse. Ignore the smiling cat. If you buy the book, enjoy it. If you don’t spend the day indulging in something else that’s just for you. You deserve it.

Be happy.

Have fun.

Say “Screw it.”

I did.

After all, no one’s going to read this anyway…right?

–Alethea Kontis,
New York Times bestselling author

Preorder Beauty & Dynamite from Apex Books here — only $15.95!

Beauty & Dynamite
has between its gorgeous covers:

* All my essays published in Apex Digest

* other essays and blogs, published and unpublished

* some poetry snippets (oh yeah!)

* interior art (and we’re talking every single page) by Daniele Serra and Judi Davidson (cover pic by Dee Clingman)

* introduction by Brian Keene

* afterward by Jason Sizemore

* Contributing fiction, non-fiction, and everything in between from: Casey A. Cothran, John Ringo, Scott M. Roberts, James Maxey, Tom Pendergrass, Tom Piccirilli, Dan, Ben, Ellen and Jackie Gamber, Chesya Burke, Maurice Broaddus, Edmund R. Schubert, Gray Rinehart, Ken Scholes….and my lovely Nana, Helen Kontis.

Jason said it’s hands down the oddest thing Apex has ever published. And one of the most stunningly beautiful.

I am so excited!!!

Remember — send me your blurbs, and please spread the word!

May you all step in interesting stories,
xox
~Alethea

Preorder Beauty & Dynamite from Apex Books here — only $15.95!