| 
Hey all,
Let me take a brief and welcome break from the stream of bad news to talk about something joyful. My new book--AN IMMENSE WORLD--is about to launch, on June 21 in the US and June 30 in the UK. I've been working on this since The Before Times, and it was a thrill to finally get the actual hard copies earlier this month. Typo, I'm sure, is also thrilled.
An Immense World is about the incredible senses of other animals--beetles that are drawn to fires, turtles that can track the Earth's magnetic fields, fish that fill rivers with electrical messages, and even humans who wield sonar like bats. Other creatures see colors, hear sounds, follow skeins of scent, and detect electric or magnetic fields that we can’t perceive. They have different conceptions of heat, pain, darkness, and silence. Their senses help us to reimagine our own surroundings. I find it breathtaking to know what birds hear in their own songs, what dogs smell on the streets, what insects feel as they stand on plants. To perceive the world through other senses is to find splendor in familiarity, wilderness in one’s backyard, the sacred in the mundane. Every page of this should have something to blow your mind, something to linger and mull over, something you’ll want to tell your friends about.
I *loved* writing this book, and I think that's reflected in some of that early reactions. It's "a joy to read" (Susan Orlean), "equal parts science and poetry" (Clint Smith), "steeped in science by suffused with magic" (Siddartha Mukherjee), a "persuasive case for more empathy" (Jeff VanderMeer), a "constantly revelatory exploration" (William Gibson), and "a tremendous burst of oxygen" (Rebecca Skloot). “I don’t know how to put into words the awe I felt while reading this book," said Mary Roach.
You can get a flavor of what the book is about in reviews in The Times (UK), Science; a piece in the New Yorker; or in interviews with me in Mother Jones, the LitHub Thresholds podcast, or the Armchair Expert podcast. There’s also a really kind and uncannily accurate profile of me in Vanity Fair that I still feel a little verklempt about. And tomorrow (Monday 13th), the Atlantic will be publishing an entire chapter from the book as the cover story of its new issue.
If you'd like to attend the launch event at Sixth & I on June 21, you can do so either in-person in Washington DC or virtually. And for those in the UK, I'll be talking at the Royal Institution on June 30.
Thanks everyone. I hope you'll give An Immense World a chance, and I hope those of you who do enjoy reading it--or listening to it; I narrated the audiobook, too--as much as I enjoy writing it.
- Ed
 | 
No comments:
Post a Comment