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About the Book

About the Book

Aesthetica

In a debut novel as radiant as it is caustic, a former influencer confronts her past --- and takes inventory of the damages that underpin the surface-glamour of social media.

At 19, she was an Instagram celebrity. Now, at 35, she works behind the cosmetic counter at the “black and white store,” peddling anti-aging products to women seeking physical and spiritual transformation. She, too, is seeking rebirth. She’s about to undergo the high-risk, elective surgery Aesthetica™, a procedure that will reverse all her past plastic surgery procedures, returning her, she hopes, to a truer self. Provided she survives the knife.

But on the eve of the surgery, her traumatic past resurfaces when she is asked to participate in the public takedown of her former manager/boyfriend, who has rebranded himself as a paragon of “woke” masculinity in the post-#MeToo world. With the hours ticking down to her surgery, she must confront the ugly truth about her experiences on and off the Instagram grid.

Propulsive, dark and moving, AESTHETICA is a Veronica for the age of “Instagram face,” delivering a fresh, nuanced examination of feminism, #MeToo and mother-daughter relationships, all while confronting our collective addiction to followers, filters and faux realities.

Audiobook available, read by Chelsea Stephens

Aesthetica
by Allie Rowbottom

  • Publication Date: October 3, 2023
  • Genres: Fiction, Women's Fiction
  • Paperback: 264 pages
  • Publisher: Soho Press
  • ISBN-10: 1641295325
  • ISBN-13: 9781641295321