Poignant and charged with hope.
– Vanessa Gebbie, author and judge of Evesham Festival Short Story Prize 2017 (Chapter 3, The Bird of Wax)
In the Blink of an Eye
by Ali Bacon
Price range: £5.99 through £7.99
Paperback: 978-0-9935997
‘He had Edinburgh at his feet, but who would be by his side?’
In 1843, Edinburgh artist, David Octavius Hill meets Robert Adamson from St Andrews and an iconic partnership is born. Hill is already a popular and charismatic figure in the art world. Adamson is a technical genius in the new science of photography. The magic they create with their camera soon makes them the darlings of society.
In this moving and original approach to biographical fiction, Ali Bacon uncovers the human stories behind the Hill and Adamson partnership, focusing on the women whose narratives are woven into his: a young girl torn between her dreams and her family expectations; an architect’s wife imprisoned in a fairy-tale castle; a fisherwoman whose life changes in the blink of the camera’s eye. Hill emerges as a man of charm and integrity, conscientious and devout but also flirtatious. When tested by the ultimate personal tragedy, he is saved by the redeeming power of love.
In the Blink of an Eye is a re-imagining of Hill’s life in the words of those who met him and sat for him. Tender, tragic and sometimes humorous, these voices come together in a story of art and science, love and loss, friendship and photography.
“That moment of dawning self-consciousness, so delicately rendered, yet so resonant … just knocked my socks off”
– Nick Bellorini, photography publisher and judge of Magic Oxygen Prize 2017 (Chapter 6, Silver Harvest)
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About Ali Bacon
After a degree in Classics from St Andrews University, Ali Bacon worked briefly in Oxford’s Bodleian Library where she stumbled on and saved a cache of famous Victorian photographs. So began a life-long interest in early photography. After a career as an academic librarian, her first novel, Kettle of Fish, was published in 2012 by Thornberry. In the Blink of an Eye marries her interests in fiction and photography. Ali now lives in Bristol where she writes and performs her work at live events.