Bloomsbury pre-empts Haynes’ non-fiction début in high five-figure deal

Bloomsbury has pre-empted Telling Time: The Forgotten Art of Sensing the Hour, a non-fiction début by Cathy Haynes.

Senior commissioning editor for non-fiction Jasmine Horsey acquired UK and Commonwealth rights on the eve of the Frankfurt Book Fair from Rowan Lawton at The Soho Agency, in a high five-figure deal. Farley Chase of Chase Literary Agency is co-agenting North American rights with Rowan Lawton. Telling Time will publish in 2025.

Telling Time is a book “devoted to bringing to life the history and art of navigating the day and night by signs from the wider world”. Haynes invites the reader to join her “in exploring the forgotten ways of telling time, not for their usefulness but for the pleasure and wonder they might bring us”.

The synopsis reads: “By tuning our mind and senses into this vast world of living rhythms beyond our clock-bound bubble, we stand to reap inner riches that bring us fascination, delight and even comfort in a time of tumult.”

Haynes is an artist and curator and has been developing a creative practice on time for 20 years. She has held positions including Timekeeper in Residence at UCL Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology in London, Chisenhale Gallery’s artist in residence in London’s Victoria Park, and curator for Art on the Underground at Transport for London. She is a contributor to shows on BBC Radio Four and publications including Vogue, Cabinet and the Guardian.

“In an age when our lives are increasingly driven by clocks and immersed in screens, the stories in Telling Time feel more important than ever,” she said. “This book explores the much-neglected crafts of sensing the hour by a glorious variety of living signs. And in the process, my hope is to enable readers to find more intrigue and pleasure in the subtle changes in their own surroundings – even in the heart of the city. I could not be more delighted and excited to be collaborating with Jasmine Horsey and the Bloomsbury team to bring Telling Time to fruition.”

Horsey added: “Everyone at Bloomsbury is thrilled to welcome Cathy Haynes to our list. Full of small wonders and drawing on the work of experts in fields as diverse as archaeology, astronomy, history, contemporary art, zoology, classical mythology and more, her book is a call for us to slow down and pay attention to the world around us. Probing, wise and above all joyful, it is truly a delight to read. I feel very lucky to play a part in bringing it to readers.”