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Atlantic Books has won a six-way auction to publish Andrew Parker’s The Line of Sight: How Vision Shapes Our Lives, “a sweeping and urgent story about the way we see”.
Publishing director for non-fiction Mike Harpley acquired UK and British Commonwealth rights (excluding Canada) from Richard Pike at C&W. The deal followed a six-way bidding war between publishers, dubbed "competitive" by Atlantic. Audio rights were acquired by Ellis Moore, rights and content manager at Bolinda, and rights have also been sold at auction in the US (WW Norton), Italy (Bollati), Netherlands (Thomas Rap), and Spain (Debate).
The Line of Sight: How Vision Shapes Our Lives will be published in hardback and e-book in September 2021.
The synopsis reads: “As our most dominant sense, sight governs how we evolved, how we behave, and nearly everything we create. In The Line of Sight, acclaimed biologist Andrew Parker tells its epic story across millions of years of evolution, to reveal vision’s long and lasting influence on the human mind.”
Atlantic said of the title: “First revealing the secrets of how we learned to see, the construct of colour, and the evolutionary innovations we still carry with us today, Andrew Parker goes on to show vision’s key role in the development of human consciousness, emotion, language and even the way that we perceive time. Finally, the book will show how by understanding this crucial sense, we can better inform future decisions about healthcare and wellbeing, the learning environments we build, the brands that inspire us, the way that we work, and the technology we create.”
Based on decades of scientific research and filled with insightful human case studies and stories from the natural world, The Line of Sight “tells a sweeping and urgent story about the way we see and how it has come to define us,” the publisher said.
Parker is a research fellow at Green Templeton College, University of Oxford and is a world-leading expert on the science of vision. He has given the prestigious annual physics lecture at Stanford University and has previously been recognised as one of the top eight scientists in the UK by The Royal Institution.
Harpley said: “Every few years you read a proposal that completely reshapes how you view humanity. This is one of them. From optical illusions to why we associate red with anger, this book is chocked full of both compelling narrative and ‘aha!’ factoids that will make perfect dinner party fodder. A testament to Andrew’s incredible scientific career, this beautifully written book will fascinate readers for years to come.”
Parker added: “I couldn't be happier that I will be working with Atlantic and with Mike. I knew immediately that we were on the same wavelength, and our connection should bring further colour to the real-life stories in this book and make clearer their enlightening common denominator - vision.”