SIMON INGS is a novelist, science writer and occasional wildlife cameraman. THE EYE was written in between the birth of his daughter (who makes several appearances in the text) and expeditions to Ladakh, Arabia’s Empty Quarter, and Arctic Norway. His science features and interviews have featured on national radio and in magazines as diverse as New Scientist, Wired and Dazed and Confused. He lives in London.

Links
Simon Ings's website

THE EYE
A Natural History

Ings deals with... all parts of this thoroughly engaging book, with refreshing clarity, enthusiasm and vigour. It's a real eye-opener – Doug Johnstone, THE TIMES

A rich and eclectic survey, with an intriguing nugget on almost every page – Graham Farmelo, SUNDAY TELEGRAPH

In many ways it's the perfectly judged popular-science book. [It] will bring out the intelligent 12-year-old in us all – Marcus Berkmann, THE SPECTATOR

Ings has succeeded in writing an elegant, entertaining and up-to-date overview of cutting-edge research... utterly compelling – Gail Vines, INDEPENDENT.

Ings has a good eye for memorable anecdotes and striking facts. More importantly, Ings is a very good explainer of scientific concepts – Robert Hanks, TELEGRAPH

* We spend about a tenth of our waking hours completely blind.

* Only one percent of what we see is in focus at any one time.

* We exist in a world we see that’s always about half a second behind the real one.

* In fact you don’t need eyes to see – blind volunteers have been taught to see through their chests.

* Wasps can’t see, but map their surroundings instead.

* If we are stared at, our heartbeat rises and our galvanic skin response alters.

* Why do humans have whites to their eyes when other species don’t?

* Could it be that thinking arose as an evolutionary response to seeing?

* Without eyes, would minds exist at all?

Be prepared to have your eyes opened!

Using a spellbinding mix of scientific research, mathematics, philosophy, history, neuroscience, anecdote and language theory, in THE EYE Simon Ings unravels brilliantly the never-ending puzzle of how and why we see in the way that we do.

From looking at the work of a huge range of theorists and scientists, to myths and personal experiences, and with the help of a beguiling mix of illustrated visual conundrums and enigmas, Simon Ings triumphs with a compelling dissection of the age-old mysteries of the eye that’s both seriously interesting and interestingly fun.

This is the eye’s whole story, fusing eye and sight into a single narrative – the science and art of vision told for the first time.

Publisher: Bloomsbury (UK)/Norton (US)*
Pub date: 19 March 2007 (UK)/13 October 2008 (US)
Length: 336 pages

All rights available excluding:
UK & Commonwealth, US, Germany (Hoffman & Campe), Italy (Einauid), Japan (Hayakawa), Portugal (Aletheia)

For international rights contact Bloomsbury

*Published in the US as A NATURAL HISTORY OF SEEING

The Weight of Numbers

The Weight of Numbers is unerringly well written, and engrossing to the last page – Lionel Shriver

One of the most exciting - and relevant - books of the last year. Booker material, for sure – ARENA

Simon Ings’ ambitiously genre-defying novel is a virtuoso display of imaginative plotting – FINANCIAL TIMES, ‘Novels of 2006’

Ings weaves an ingenious, shimmering web of contiguity and chance... a feat of meticulous plotting – Alastair Sooke, NEW STATESMAN

It is unlikely there will be a finer written fiction this year... Ings arrives at a new heart of darkness – Chris Petit, GUARDIAN

On 21 July 1969 two astronauts set foot on the moon; far below, in ravaged Mozambique, a young revolutionary is murdered by a package bomb. Strung like webs between these two unconnected events are three lives: Anthony Burden, a mathematical genius destroyed by the beauty of numbers; Saul Cogan, transformed from prankster idealist to trafficker in the poor and dispossessed; and Stacey Chavez, ex-teenage celebrity and mediocre performance artist, hungry for fame and starved of love. All are haunted by Nick Jinks, a man who sows disaster wherever he goes.

As a grid of connections emerges between a dusty philosophical society in London and an African revolution, between international container shipping and celebrity-hosted exposés on the problems of the Third World, THE WEIGHT OF NUMBERS sends the spectres of the baby boom’s liberal revolutions floating into the unreal estate of globalization and media overload.

Publisher: Atlantic (UK)/Black Cat (Grove Atlantic) (US)*
Pub date: 2 March 2006 (UK)/21 February 2007 (US)
Length: 432 pages

All rights available excluding:
UK & Commonwealth, US, Canada (HarperCollins), Czech Republic (Lidove Noviny), France (Editions du Panama), Germany (Manhattan), Greece (Malliaris), Italy (Saggiatore), Portugal (Leya), Russia (AST), Spain (Bibliópolis), Turkey (Everest)

For international rights contact Atlantic Books