Sigma catalogue 2016

Bloomsbury’s popular science imprint, Sigma A celebration of great writing, with a roster of brilliant new authors Sigma – making serious science seriously accessible

Helen Pilcher - page 7

David Hone - page 5

Laurie Winkless - page 7

David Sumpter - page 5

Helen Scales - page 1

Rob Brotherton - page 3

Jules Howard - page 4

Amy Shira Teitel - page 2

Kate Devlin - page 8

Kat Arney - page 3

Timandra Harkness - p.6

Liam Drew - page 8

Louisa Preston - page 6

Tom Jackson - page 1

Nicola Temple - page 4

rights@bloomsbury.com

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Spirals in Time The Secret Life and Curious Afterlife of Seashells

Helen Scales The shell-making molluscs are among the most successful animals on the planet. They live extraordinary lives in many strange places; they provide food and homes for other animals, and across the ages, their shells, sculpted by evolution and mathematics, have become powerful symbols of sex and death, prestige and war.

Shells offer an accessible way to reconnect people with nature, helping heal the rift between ourselves and the living world. Snails’ Tears and Thunderstones is a biography of the seashell. It shows why nature matters, and reveals the secrets of these wonders of calcium carbonate that you can hold in the palm of your hand.

may 2015 HARDBACK / 9781472911360 / £16.99 EBOOK / 9781472911377 / £14.99

Following her doctorate on the biology of the humphead wrasse, Helen Scales tagged sharks in California, catalogued marine life in the Andaman Sea, and studied the coral reefs of the South Pacific, before becoming an author and presenter of science programmes on BBC Radio 4. Her credits include regular appearances on Inside Science and Home Planet, and a coveted spot on The Museum of Curiosity. helenscales.com / @helenscales

paperback / 9781472911384 / £9.99 territory: WORLD Rights sold: world english, CHINESE MAINLAND, JAPANESE WORD COUNT: 90,000

A bbc radio 4 book of the week

Chilled How the Refrigerator Changed the World ... and Might Do So Again Tom Jackson The refrigerator in your kitchen is one of the true wonders of 20th century science – life-saver, food-preserver and social liberator, while the science of refrigeration is crucial, not just in transporting food around the globe but in a host of branches on the scientific tree. Refrigeration and its discovery provides the remarkable backdrop to Chilled, the story of how science managed to rewrite the rules of food. It tells us how the technology whirring behind every refrigerator is at play, unseen, in a surprisingly broad sweep of modern life, and has been crucial in some of the most important scientific breakthroughs of the last 100 years, from the discovery of superconductors to the search for the Higgs boson.

July 2015 HARDBACK / 9781472911438 / £16.99 EBOOK / 9781472911421 / £14.99

Tom Jackson is a science writer who specialises in recasting science and technology into lively historical narratives, told through the deeds of the people that discovered them. After almost 20 years of writing nonfiction, Tom has uncovered a wealth of stories that help to bring technical content alive and create new ways of enjoying learning about science.

paperback / 9781472911445 / £9.99 territory: WORLD Rights sold: world english, Korean WORD COUNT: 82,000

tomjackson.weebly.com / @jinjatom bloomsbury sigma

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A is for Arsenic The Poisons of Agatha Christie

Kathryn Harkup Fifteen novels. Fifteen poisons. Just because its fiction doesn’t mean its all made-up ...

september 2015 HARDBACK / 9781472911308 / £16.99 trade paperback / 9781472911315 / £12.99 EBOOK / 9781472911292 / £14.99 paperback / 9781472911322 / £9.99 territory: WORLD Rights sold: World english, romanian,

Agatha Christie used poison to kill her characters more often than any other crime-fiction writer. The poison is a central part of the novel, while Christie’s choice of deadly substances was far from random; the chemical and physiological characteristics of each poison provide vital clues to identity of the murderer. A is for Arsenic celebrates the use of science in Christie’s work. It looks at why certain chemicals kill, how they interact with the body, and the feasibility of obtaining, administering and detecting these poisons, both when the novel was written and today.

Kathryn Harkup completed a degree, a PhD and a postdoc in chemistry before realising that talking and writing about science appealed more than hours slaving over a hot fume-hood. She is now a science communicator, specialising on the quirky side of science.

french, japanese, KOREAN WORD COUNT: 90,000

www.harkup.co.uk / @RotwangsRobot

Breaking the Chains of Gravity The Story of Spaceflight before NASA

Amy Shira Teitel NASA’s history is a familiar story, culminating with the agency successfully landing men on the Moon in 1969. But NASA’s prehistory is a rarely told tale, one that is largely absent from the popular space-age literature but that gives the context behind the lunar program. America’s space agency wasn’t created in a vacuum; it drew together some of the best minds the non-Soviet world had to offer.

october 2015 HARDBACK / 9781472911179 / £16.99 TRADE PAPERBACK / 9781472911186 / £12.99 EBOOK / 9781472911193 / £14.99 paperback / 9781472911247 / £9.99 RIGHTS AVAILABLE: WORLD WORD COUNT: 95,000

From Wernher von Braun fleeing the ruins of Berlin to the Mercury programme, tests of new technologies by pilots such as Neil Armstrong and, in the shadow of Sputnik, the final creation by Dwight D. Eisenhower of NASA, Breaking the Chains of Gravity tells the story of NASA’s roots in an engaging and accessible way, against a backdrop of nazism, communism and imminent nuclear annihilation.

Amy Shira Teitel is an author and expert in the history of science, with a lifelong passion for spaceflight. An accomplished science communicator, Amy regularly appears on Discovery News and Al-Jazeera. amyshirateitel.com / @astVintageSpace

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Suspicious Minds Why we believe conspiracy theories

Rob Brotherton Conspiracy theories have been widespread throughout history, from ancient Rome to 9/11 and JFK. Inside Job explores the psychology of this phenomenon, and sheds light on the important consequences conspiracy theories have on society. Conspiracy theorists are not limited to people wearing tin-foil hats or with bizarre ideas about shape-shifting reptilian aliens. Conspiracies are as likely to appeal to women as men, college students as underprivileged youths, middle-class parents as blue-collar workers. Psychological research shows that this is due to a complex mix of personality traits and psychological drives such as the desire for excitement, control, and possession of privileged knowledge.

We’re all born conspiracy theorists. This brilliant book tells you why

NOVEMBER 2015 HARDBACK / 9781472915610 / £16.99 TRADE paperback / 9781472915627 / £12.99 EBOOK / 9781472915641 / £14.99

Rob Brotherton is a leading expert on the psychology of conspiracy theory. Following his doctorate, he went on to become a lecturer in psychology at Goldsmiths, University of London, and has written about conspiracy theories for periodicals such as New Scientist.

paperback / 9781472915634 / £9.99 territory: WORLD Rights sold: World english, chinese (taiwan), Chiinese (mainland) WORD COUNT: 95,000

conspiracypsychology.com / @rob_brotherton

Herding Hemingway’s Cats Understanding How Genes Work

Kat Arney The language of genes has become common parlance. We know they make your eyes blue, your hair curly or your nose straight. Newspapers tell us that our genes control our risks of cancer, heart disease, alcoholism or Alzheimer’s. Six hundred pounds will buy you your very own genome readout, neatly stored on a USB stick. And advances in genetic medicine hold huge promise. So we’ve all heard of genes, but how do they actually work?

Drawing on stories ranging from six-toed cats to fish hips, werewolves and zombie genes, geneticist Kat Arney explores how DNA is packed, unpacked and read, creating a companion reader to the book of life itself.

january 2016 HARDBACK / 9781472910042 / £16.99 TRADE paperback / 9781472910059 / £12.99

Following a doctorate and research career in genetics, Kat Arney is now Science Communications Manager for Cancer Research UK, helping people understand the disease. According to BBC America, Kat is one of the ‘Top 10 Brits Who Make Science Sexy’, and she regularly appears on national TV and radio shows to talk about the latest genetic research.

EBOOK / 9781472910066 / £14.99 paperback / 9781472910073 / £9.99 RIGHTS AVAILABLE: WORLD WORD COUNT: 91,000

katarney.wordpress.com / @harpistkat bloomsbury sigma

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Sorting the Beef from the Bull The Science of Food Forensics

Richard Evershed and Nicola Temple Horsemeat in burgers, melamine in infant’s milk, artificial colours in our fish and fruit … as our urban lifestyle takes us further away from our food sources, there are increasing opportunities for dishonest, profitmaking short-cuts. Food adulteration costs the food industry billions of dollars each year; the price to consumers may be even higher, with some paying for these crimes with their health and, in some cases, their lives.

February 2016 hardback / 9781472911339 / £16.99 TRade paperback / 9781472911339 / £12.99

This book explains the scientific tools used in the fightback against the fraudsters. It explores the arms race between scientists and adulterers, and looks at the up-and-coming techniques that will help battle food fraud in the future. Sorting the Beef… brings the full story of a fascinating and under-reported applied science to light.

EBOOK / 9781472911346 / £10.99 paperback / 9781472911353 / £9.99 territory: WORLD Rights sold: Japanese, RUSsian WORD COUNT: 90,000

Richard Evershed FRS is Professor of Biogeochemistry at the University of Bristol. Having been at the forefront of analytical chemistry for more than thirty years, his methodologies have been crucial in the fight against food fraudsters. Nicola Temple is a biologist, conservationist and science writer. www.nicolatemple.com / @nicolatemple

Death on Earth Adventures in Evolution and Mortality

Jules Howard Planet Earth teems with trillions of life-forms, eating, reproducing, thriving … Yet the life of every one draws nearer and nearer to certain death. Why? Why is death such a universal companion to life on Earth?

Why haven’t animals evolved to break free of its shackles?

march 2016 hardback / 9781472915078 / £16.99

In this ground-breaking exploration of death, Jules Howard attempts to shed evolutionary light on one of our most unshakeable taboos.

Encountering some of the world’s oldest animals and meeting the scientists attempting to unravel their mysteries, his journey ends with our own fate: can we ever become immortal? And even if we could, would we really want to?

TRade paperback / 9781472915085 / £12.99 EBOOK / 9781472915108 / £10.99 paperback / 9781472915092 / £9.99 RIGHTS AVAILABLE: WORLD WORD COUNT: 83,000

Jules Howard is a zoologist, writer and broadcaster. He is a features writer for BBC Countryfile magazine, and a regular contributor to the Guardian, the Independent, and BBC Wildlife, for whom he is a judge for the Wildlife Writer of the Year award. His TV work incorporates regular appearances on Inside Out, BBC Breakfast and The One Show. www.juleshoward / @juleslhoward

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The Tyrannosaur Chronicles The Biology of the Tyrant Dinosaurs

David Hone Tyrannosaurus is by some margin the most famous dinosaur in the world.

It topped 10 tons, was more than 15m long, and had the largest head and most powerful bite of any land animal, ever.

The Tyrannosaur Chronicles tracks the rise of these dinosaurs, and presents the latest research into their biology, showing off more than just their impressive statistics – tyrannosaurs had feathers, may have hunted in groups, and fought and even ate each other. This entertaining book presents the science behind this research, and explores how they came to be the dominant terrestrial predators of the Mesozoic and, in more recent times, one of the great icons of biology.

David Hone is Lecturer in Ecology at QMW in London. He has published more than 50 academic papers on dinosaur biology and behaviour, with a particular interest in the tyrannosaurs, while his fieldwork has included a spell working on the famous feathered dinosaur deposits of China. David’s writing credits include the BBC’s Walking with Dinosaurs.

APRIL 2016 HARDBACK / 9781472911254 / £16.99 TRADE paperback / 9781472911261 / £12.99 EBOOK / 9781472911278 / £14.99 paperback / 9781472911285 / £9.99 RIGHTS AVAILABLE: WORLD WORD COUNT: 89,000

theguardian.com/science/lost-worlds / @Dave_Hone

Soccermatics Mathematical Adventures in the Beautiful Game

David Sumpter Football – the most mathematical of sports – is riddled with numbers, patterns and shapes. How to make sense of them? The answer lies in mathematical modelling, an applied science with applications in a host of biological systems. More than a Game brings the two together in a thrilling, mind-bending synthesis.

What’s the similarity between an ant colony and Total Football, Dutch style? How is the Barcelona midfield linked geometrically? And how can we relate the mechanics of a Mexican Wave to the singing of cicadas in a Greek valley? Welcome to the world of mathematical modelling, expressed brilliantly by David Sumpter through the prism of football.

Football – more than a game, and packed with game theory.

MAY 2016 HARDBACK / 9781472924124 / £16.99 TRADE paperback / 9781472924131 / £12.99 EBOOK / 9781472924155 / £14.99

David Sumpter is Professor of Applied Mathematics at the University of Uppsala, Sweden, where he runs the Collective Behaviour Research Group. An incomplete list of research subjects that he’s modelled include pigeons in pairs over Oxford, Cuban leaf-cutter ant traffic, the gaze of London commuters, and the tubular structures of Japanese slime moulds.

paperback / 9781472924148 / £9.99 territory: WORLD Rights sold: World english, spanish, german, swedish WORD COUNT: 85,000

www.collective-behavior.com / @djtsumpter bloomsbury sigma

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Big Data Does Size Matter?

Timandra Harkness Data is big, and getting bigger. It can help us do things faster and more efficiently than ever before, and has made possible scientific and social achievements that would have been impossible just a few years ago. But are we being bamboozled by its size, its speed and its shiny technology?

It’s big, but it’s not always clever.

june 2016 HARDBACK / 9781472920058 / £16.99

Timandra Harkness cuts through the hype to put data science into real-life context. Stories, jokes and personal asides bring to life what is essentially a human science, demystifying Big Data, telling us where it comes from and what it can do for us – and what it can’t. This book asks you to decide – are you a data point, or a human being?

EBOOK / 9781472920065 / £14.99 paperback / 9781472920072 / £9.99 RIGHTS AVAILABLE: WORLD WORD COUNT: 87,000

Timandra Harkness is a writer and comedian who has been performing on mathematical topics since the latter days of the 20th century. In 2010 she co-wrote and performed The Maths of Death, a smash hit at the Edinburgh Fringe, and she is currently on tour with her latest solo show, Brainsex. Timandra is the presenter of BBC Radio 4’s The Human Zoo. www.timandraharkness.com / @TimandraHarknes

Goldilocks and the Water Bears The Search for Life in the Universe

Louisa Preston Across a Universe of at least 100 billion habitable, earth-like worlds, life cannot be restricted to Earth – or can it? We can learn much about the possibilities of extraterrestrial life by studying the conveyer belt of life forms over the planet’s history, and by exploring organisms present in harsh environments on Earth that mimic those on other worlds.

These extreme-loving organisms are directing our search for alien life throughout the Solar System and beyond. Could we one day find Earth’s toughest animal, the microscopic water bear, living on the surface of another world? july 2016 HARDBACK / 9781472920096 / £16.99 TRADE paperback / 9781472920102 / £12.99 EBOOK / 9781472920089 / £14.99 paperback / 9781472920119 / £9.99 RIGHTS AVAILABLE: WORLD WORD COUNT: 84,000

Goldilocks and the Water Bears is an accessible introduction to the most fascinating of all the astro-sciences – the quest to learn whether we are alone in the Universe.

Louisa Preston is an astrobiologist and planetary geologist, whose research has included the search for signatures of life that could survive the harsh environments of Mars. She has a Ph.D. in Astrobiology and Planetary Geology from Imperial College London. louisajpreston.com / @LouisaJPreston

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Science and the City The Mechanics Behind the Metropolis

Laurie Winkless There is a surprising amount of hidden science behind urban life, which secretly keeps things moving. Science and the City describes how technological advances in fields as diverse as quantum mechanics, ergonomics and thermodynamics provide solutions to the urban problems of the future – 50% of the world’s population now lives in cities, and that proportion is growing fast. Can technology provide the answer to a viable megacity future?

Written in an informal and enjoyable style by Laurie Winkless, Science and the City is built on solid foundations of science fact, with a decent sprinkling of speculation on top.

august 2016 HARDBACK / 9781472913210 / £16.99 TRADE paperback / 9781472915382 / £12.99

Laurie Winkless is a physicist from London (via Dublin). Formerly a researcher at the National Physical Laboratory, Laurie went on to research the physics of thermoelectric energy harvesting before moving into science communication. An experienced commentator on physics and technology issues, she has given TEDx talks, worked as a reporter for the Naked Scientists, and appeared in The Times magazine.

EBOOK / 9781472913227 / £14.99 paperback / 9781472913234 / £9.99 RIGHTS AVAILABLE: WORLD WORD COUNT: 85,000

lauriewinkless.wordpress.com / @laurie_winkless

Bring Back the King The New Science of De-extinction

Helen Pilcher If you could bring back one living being from the whole of the history of time, what would you choose? In Bring back the King, comedian and former stem-cell biologist Helen Pilcher explains the cutting-edge science that makes the resurrection of extinct animals a very real possibility, and highlights her choices from geological eras gone by, from the King of the Dinosaurs, Tyrannosaurus rex, to the King of Rock ’n’ Roll, Elvis Presley.

Funny, intriguing and informative, Bring Back the King investigates current initiatives to resurrect entire species from their stony graves, and uses both science and willful irreverence to assess how these genetic Lazaruses might fare in their brave new world. Unique and brilliantly written, Bring Back the King is a book that you will simply have to read.

September 2016 HARDBACK / 9781472912251 / £16.99 TRADE paperback / 9781472912268 / £12.99 EBOOK / 9781472912282/ £14.99

A stand-up comedian for more than ten years, Helen Pilcher performed at clubs such as the Comedy Store, Jongleurs and at the Edinburgh Festival, before the arrival of children meant she couldn’t physically stay awake beyond 9pm. Unusually, Helen is also a professional science writer with a PhD in stem-cell biology, who writes for Nature and New Scientist.

paperback / 9781472912275 / £9.99 RIGHTS AVAILABLE: WORLD WORD COUNT: 80,000

helenpilcher.com / @HelenPilcher1y. bloomsbury sigma

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Furry Logic The Physics of Animal Life

Matin Durrani & Liz Kalaugher Furry Logic is an exploration of the cool physics animals use in weird, intriguing ways as part of their daily battle to survive, as uncovered by scientists researching the field of biomechanics.

The book is divided into seven chapters, each representing a separate arm of physics. Each chapter examines the animals’ key features before describing the ways they use physics, how this was discovered, and what remains to be found out.

October 2016 HARDBACK / 9781472914095 / £16.99 EBOOK / 9781472914101 / £14.99 paperback / 9781472914118 / £9.99 Rights available: WORLD WORD COUNT: 80,000

This book makes the incredible interdisciplinary world of animal biomechanics accessible to all, in an enthralling and entertaining read.

Matin Durrani is the editor of Physics World. After his PhD at the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge, Matin did a postdoc before moving into publishing in the late 1990s. Liz Kalaugher also has a PhD in physics, along with qualifications in biological sciences. She is the editor of environmentalresearchweb.org, a leading news resource on environmental issues. @MatinDurrani / @LizKalaugher

The Brightness of Things An Adventure in Light and Time

Kate Devlin We are surrounded by the material culture of the people who lived before us: architecture, artworks and artefacts. But can we be certain that what we observe is the same as what the original creators of these items saw?

NOVEMBER 2016 HARDBACK / 9781472912770 / £16.99

Light can’t be captured in the archaeological record, of course, yet lighting conditions can completely alter our perception, leading to dramatic changes in interpretation for archaeologists, art historians and psychologists. The Colourful Past examines how our understanding of the past has often been surprisingly inaccurate, and how the latest virtualreality techniques are providing startling insights into archaeological places, objects and peoples.

TRADE paperback / 9781472912787 / £12.99 EBOOK / 9781472912794 / £14.99 paperback / 9781472912800 / £9.99 RIGHTS AVAILABLE: WORLD WORD COUNT: 85,000

Kate Devlin is a lecturer at Goldsmiths, University of London. While completing her PhD in computer graphics and visual perception, Kate began to question the validity of the images that were created as archaeological reconstructions, and she started exploring the psychology of visual perception. Since publishing one of the first papers in the field in 2001, Kate has become a leading expert in archaeology and perception. @drkatedevlin

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Bloomsbury’s popular science imprint, Sigma A celebration of great writing, with a roster of brilliant new authors Sigma – making serious science seriously accessible

Helen Pilcher - page 7

David Hone - page 5

Laurie Winkless - page 7

David Sumpter - page 5

Helen Scales - page 1

Rob Brotherton - page 3

Jules Howard - page 4

Amy Shira Teitel - page 2

Kate Devlin - page 8

Kat Arney - page 3

Timandra Harkness - p.6

Liam Drew - page 8

Louisa Preston - page 6

Tom Jackson - page 1

Nicola Temple - page 4

rights@bloomsbury.com

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www.bloomsbury.com

09/03/2016 09:04