A hundred awesome things arrived in the mail today.

290 pages from around the world.

Yes, I’ve written about 100 Stories for Haiti a lot over the last month-and-a-half, from hearing about the project in late January to teasers from the first 34 stories last week.  (I was going to link to all the entries individually, but you know what? Here – I’ve made it easy to catch up by doing the blog search for you.) But I’m humbled and amazed and proud to be a part of it, and if Ive babbled and badgered even one person in to buying a copy – electronic or paperback – choose your own! – then the Red Cross relief effort wins.

So even though I’ve been reading my e-version, I was thrilled to find the actual paperback in my mailbox this afternoon.

And it turns out there are way more than a hundred awesome things in here.

You figure the stories for starters, even though I’m not counting my own  – not because I’m not proud of it but because I don’t want to go around saying it’s “awesome,” especially in light of the stunning work I’ve encountered so far, and I’m only on page 135. Then there’s the introduction, which is easily worth a point on its own, and the dedication, and the special thanks page, which again reminds me that I’m in the company of many incredibly talented and generous people. And again, there’s the reminder of why all this was done in the first place, right there on the cover: “All proceeds go to helping the victims of the Haiti earthquake.”

That is a lot of good stuff packed into a little package from Liverpool.

Pre-order “100 Stories for Haiti”

Thanks to the timely arrival of some funds in my PayPal account, I just ordered my paperback copy of  100 Stories for Haiti.

The paperback edition from Bridge House Publishing in the UK is set for a March 4 release, and there’s a Smashwords electronic edition on the way, too.

This is such an amazingly cool worldwide effort, and if you don’t believe me, check the list of author bios, which is not only jaw-dropping in its diversity but has introduced several new writers and books to my own must-read list.

Still on the fence? Consider this bit from Nick Harkaway, author of The Gone-Away World:

“Of course, while giving is, according to a recent scientific study, more pleasurable and healthy than receiving, it can become a bit burdensome after a while — especially if you can’t see the real time effects of your gifts. That’s where this book comes in. The writers and publishers will do the actual giving, and you just have to buy some really great stories which you would, of course, have rushed to buy anyway because of the sheer weight of unrefined awesome contained within these covers.”

So you get 80,000-plus words of good book, and all the proceeds go to the Red Cross’ relief efforts in Haiti.

Now, here’s what you do: You can go to the 100 Stories for Haiti site and order from there, or to the Bridge House site and order from there. If, like me, you’re ordering from the U.S., since the book project is UK-based, you’ll need to buy through that little button/option marked “Rest of World” or “ROW” (a note of caution: I very nearly ordered an extra UK-shipped edition due to a default setting somewhere that put both an ROW order and a standard order in my PayPal cart, so play close attention). And PayPal automatically handled the pounds-to-dollars conversion swimmingly, I say.

Also, tell a lot of people about it.