Usborne picks up 'incredible' eco-adventure from Duggan  

Usborne has landed The Light Thieves, a “hugely ambitious” novel from Helena Duggan.  

Fiction deputy director Anne Finnis acquired world all language rights from Jordan Lees at the Blair Partnership. The Light Thieves will be published in September 2022.  

After the success of her first novel, A Place Called Perfect (Usborne), which was selected as the Waterstones Children’s Book of the Month, Duggan is now asking what happens when tech giants start harvesting the world’s natural resources at the expense of everyone else.

The publisher wrote: “Who would you trust to save the world? A boy or a billionaire? Grian lives in a world dominated by Howard Hansom and his large tech company. There has been an earthquake and a mysterious black mark has appeared on the sun. Everyone believes the world is in peril and are flocking to a city called the Tipping Point, billed as a city of dreams where people can live until the world is made safe again. However, nothing is as it seems – or as it’s being shown in the media – and what Grian and his friends uncover is truly shocking and part of a much larger plot to ensure the survival of the few at the expense of many others.”  

“The Light Thieves is clever, quirky and hugely imaginative,” said Finnis. “This child-centred story explores the power of the tech giants and their ability to persuade our thinking and confirm our convictions, against a backdrop that illuminates the importance of the sun and the natural world to our survival.” 

Duggan added: “The story of The Light Thieves has been swirling around my mind for years, but it took the births of my two children to solidify: it sprouted into an idea of what this world is versus a hope for what it could be. I want my girls to grow up in a place where we deeply know all of life is precious and choose to live in harmony with it. I believe this kind of world can exist and The Light Thieves is my grapple with how that might happen. My characters showed me that the future is our children’s and if we listen hard enough to them, they’ll teach us how to write it.”