Preorders are now open for my gothic dark fantasy novella We Who Hunt Alexanders, which will be published on July 22 by Apex Books. I think this is one of the best stories I've ever written and also one of my most timely, with the story extremely relevant in today's world.

Quick story summary: Amelia is a ripper, a monster who feeds exclusively on violent people. But where most rippers feel only anger, Amelia experiences every emotion just like the humans she hunts. Can this neurodivergent monster survive a hateful world while also saving her family and friends?

You can read the complete story synopsis below. Also, Asya Yordanova created the amazing cover art.

Preorders are very important to the success of a book. So if this story interests you, please consider placing a preorder through the Apex Books website.

Here are some of the early reactions to We Who Hunt Alexanders:

"Sanford has written a wonderfully paradoxical story: horrific yet sweet, subtle yet blunt, rageful yet loving, historical and—unfortunately—all too timely. I came away both disturbed and comforted, and I very much enjoyed it." —Jim Hines, author of the Magic ex Libris series

"By turns dark and deeply touching, We Who Hunt Alexanders is a tightly crafted rumination on fanaticism, monstrousness, and the power of community in a hostile world. With a fascinating new monster, a delightful supporting cast, and some epically bloody comeuppance, this is not one to miss." —Samantha Mills, author of The Wings Upon Her Back

"We Who Hunt Alexanders is a fast-paced novella interlaced with mystery, exploring rage, violence, and the abuse of power while unpacking new truths and unravelling the previously known. It is a bloody yet comforting story about learning to love and trust after being taught to harden against the cruelty of the world and the difficulty of solving problems if you can't reach the rotten roots, and only trim its branches." —Ai Jiang, Nebula and Bram Stoker Award-winning author of Linghun

"If you could rid the world of evil by eating it—by literally becoming the hell that will torture the blackguards you consume—would you? Jason Sanford's We Who Hunt Alexanders puts this very moral quandary before us, in a grisly, action-packed tale of murder, loyalty, and more zugzwangs. By testing the human heart under the most unimaginably difficult circumstances, Sanford delivers a frightening, cathartic meditation on just how far we'd go for the ones we love—even when we aren't sure what love even is." —Carlos Hernandez, author of Sal and Gabi Fix the Universe

Story Synopsis for We Who Hunt Alexanders

Amelia is a ripper, a monster who feeds on violent people who have so thoroughly forsaken love that they've burned away their souls. Unseen and unnoticed by most of society and living as both hunter and hunted, the only emotion rippers feel is anger. But Amelia is different from her fellow rippers and also feels happiness, sadness, fear, love and every other emotion. To her mother, Danjay, that makes Amelia the strangest of all monsters.

Driven from their home by religious zealots, Amelia and Danjay must learn to survive in the city of Medea, where violent men rule and kill anyone who opposes them. Worse, Amelia has never hunted on her own, and her mother is ill and growing weaker by the day. Only a chance encounter with a human who can see Amelia gives her any hope that she might be able to save her mother.

To succeed, Amelia must learn to hunt in an increasingly dangerous city brought to the brink of war by the corrupt, rich and powerful. Amelia will also have to discover if her differences from her fellow rippers makes her weak, as her mother believes, or if she can instead be a new kind of monster that the world has never seen before.