Penguin Press pre-empts The Light Ages

Penguin Press has pre-empted The Light Ages, a book centred on a St Albans monk by University of Cambridge historian Seb Falk. 

Casiana Ionita, editorial director at Penguin Press, acquired UK and Commonwealth rights in a pre-empt from Andrew Gordon at David Higham Associates.

In the book, Falk sets out to challenge the assumption that scientific progress stopped between the end of the classical era and the Renaissance by following the story of John of Westwyk, a St Albans monk. Falk researched the scientific networks and inventions that filled universities, monasteries and royal courts in the middle ages. Following the instructions in manuscript manuals, he made his own medieval astronomical and navigational instruments, testing them on land and out at sea.

Allen Lane is publishing in hardback in 2020.