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A Piece of Blue Sky

Author	Jon Atack
Language	English
Subject	Scientology
Genre	Non-fiction
Publisher	Lyle Stuart Books, Carol Publishing Group
Publication date	August 19, 1990; 2013 (republished)
Publication place	United Kingdom, United States
Media type	Print (Hardcover)
Pages	448
ISBN	081840499X
OCLC	20934706
Dewey Decimal	299/.936/092 20

A Piece of Blue Sky: Scientology, Dianetics and L. Ron Hubbard Exposed is a 1990 book about L. Ron Hubbard and the development of Dianetics and Scientology, authored by British former Scientologist Jon Atack. It was republished in 2013 with the title Let's sell these people A Piece of Blue Sky: Hubbard, Dianetics and Scientology. The title originates from a quote of Hubbard from 1950; an associate of Hubbard's noted him saying that he wanted to sell potential members "a piece of blue sky".

The work has been reviewed favourably by scholars in the field of new religious movements. A review in the academic publication Marburg Journal of Religion called it "the most thorough general history of Hubbard and Scientology". Stephen A. Kent, a professor of sociology who researches new religious movements, described the work as "an unrivalled piece of superb scholarship".

The Scientology organisation's publishing arm, New Era Publications International, unsuccessfully tried to prevent the book's publication, having argued that it infringed on its copyright of Hubbard's works. The US district court in New York ruled against publication of the version of the book that included excerpts from Hubbard's writings, but the decision was overturned by a federal appeals court in New Era Publications International ApS v. Carol Publishing Group and Jonathan Caven-Atack.

The author

Jon Atack joined Scientology at the age of nineteen in 1974, and was based largely in the Church of Scientology's British headquarters at Saint Hill Manor, near East Grinstead. During his training, he said he progressed to Scientology's Operating Thetan level 5 (OT5), completing 24 of the 27 levels of progress within Scientology.

He left the organisation in 1983 disillusioned with the new leadership of David Miscavige, who took over in the early 1980s. He wrote that he saw the new management as tough and ruthless, and objected particularly to the 15-fold increase in training fees. He also objected to being told not to have relationships with so-called "Suppressive Persons", meaning those whom the organisation had declared enemies and whom should not be communicated with; one such person was one of Atack's friends.

Atack's work has frequently been cited as a source in academic publications. A notable example is the 2009 volume Scientology, in which Atack's scholarship is cited by several contributors. He is also the author of a booklet, The Total Freedom Trap: Scientology, Dianetics And L. Ron Hubbard (1992), and a 2015 book Opening Minds: The secret world of manipulation, undue influence and brainwashing which was republished in 2021 as Opening Our Minds : Avoiding abusive relationships and authoritarian groups.

Synopsis

The book is arranged into nine parts, plus introductory material. In part 1, Atack describes his personal experience in the Scientology organisation. Parts 2 – 8 provide a chronological history of L. Ron Hubbard, Dianetics and Scientology, researched from paper sources and interviews. The final part draws conclusions about the belief system of Scientology and its founder. The book also contains a preface by Russell Miller, author of Bare-faced Messiah.

Reception

Marco Frenschkowski, writing in the Marburg Journal of Religion in 1999, describes A Piece of Blue Sky as "the most thorough general history of Hubbard and Scientology, very bitter, but always well-researched." It has been widely used as a source in scholarship, and is cited in several academic publications. The Tampa Tribune-Times said that Atack's provision of extensive detail and source notes for each claim sometimes gets in the way of the story, but prevents the book from being just another bitter diatribe against Scientology.

When republished in 2013, the scholar of new religious movements Stephen A. Kent called the book "an unrivalled piece of superb scholarship...All future scholarship on Scientology will build upon his contribution."

Legal action

Scientology's publishing arm, New Era Publications International, attempted to prevent publication by arguing that the manuscript's inclusion of material by Hubbard infringed on their copyright of Hubbard's work, and would harm sales of the original texts. The court ruled that the manuscript might discourage people from buying Hubbard's books by convincing them he was a swindler, and that copyright law protects rather than forbids this kind of criticism. Before the outcome of the case was known, the publisher prepared two versions of the book: one with and one without Hubbard's quoted material. After publication, Scientologists picketed Atack's East Grinstead home for six days and spread defamatory leaflets around his neighbourhood.

In April 1995, a court in England held that Atack had libelled Margaret Hodkin, the headmistress of Scientology's Greenfields School in England, and issued an injunction forbidding publication of an offending paragraph. The decision was upheld by the High Court in London in May 1995. The case led Amazon to remove the book from its listings in February 1999, but it reversed its decision a few months later after customers complained.

See also

• Scientology controversies
• Books critical of Scientology

References

1. Atack, Jon (1990). A Piece of Blue Sky: Scientology, Dianetics and L. Ron Hubbard Exposed. Lyle Stuart Books. p. iii. ISBN 081840499X. OL 9429654M. It was 1950, in the early, heady days of Dianetics, soon after L. Ron Hubbard opened the doors of his first organization to the clamoring crowd. Up until then, Hubbard was known only to readers of pulp fiction, but now he had an instant best-seller with a book that promised to solve every problem of the human mind, and the cash was pouring in. Hubbard found it easy to create schemes to part his new following from their money. One of the first tasks was to arrange "grades" of membership, offering supposedly greater rewards, at increasingly higher prices. Over thirty years later, an associate wryly remembered Hubbard turning to him and confiding, no doubt with a smile, "Let's sell these people a piece of blue sky.
2. ^ "Publisher Victorious on Hubbard Biography". The New York Times. May 27, 1990. Archived from the original on May 25, 2015.
3. ^ Atack, Jon (1990). A Piece of Blue Sky: Scientology, Dianetics and L. Ron Hubbard Exposed. Lyle Stuart Books. ISBN 081840499X. OL 9429654M.
4. ^ Shinkle, Kevin. "The religion that sells the sky," The Tampa Tribune-Times, October 20, 1991.
5. Lewis, James R., ed. (March 2009). Scientology. New York/Oxford: Oxford University Press. pp. 54, 75, 89, 91, 100, 259, 262, 369, 371. ISBN 9780195331493.
6. OCLC 34443736
7. ISBN 9780997109634
8. ISBN 9781919625805
9. Frenschkowski, Marco (July 1999). "L. Ron Hubbard and Scientology: An annotated bibliographical survey of primary and selected secondary literature". Marburg Journal of Religion. 4 (1): 7.
10. For examples, see Kent, Stephen A. "Scientology: Is this a Religion?", Marburg Journal of Religion, Volume 4, issue 1, July 1999; Kent, Stephen A. "The Globalization of Scientology: Influence, Control and Opposition in Transnational Markets", Religion, Volume 29, issue 2, pp. 147–169; West, Louis Jolyon. "Psychiatry and Scientology," American Psychiatric Association Annual Meeting, Washington D.C., May 6, 1992.
11. Ortega, Tony (February 7, 2013). "More Scientology News in Thursday Roundup". The Underground Bunker. Retrieved August 19, 2020.
12. "Let's sell these people A Piece of Blue Sky: Hubbard, Dianetics and Scientology (overview section)". Barnes & Noble. Retrieved January 14, 2023.
13. Harris, Daniel (July 2, 1989). "Scientology's best seller". New York Post. p. 39.
14. Hurowitz, Richard (1997). "Surviving Copyright Infringement: Fair Use of Protected Works in "Biopics"". The Columbia Journal of Law & the Arts. 22 (2). Columbia Law School: 247–268. ISSN 1544-4848.
15. Palmer, Richard (April 3, 1994). "Cult Accused of Intimidation". The Sunday Times.; "Victims who are 'fair game'". Evening Argus. Brighton (UK). April 12, 1994. pp. 2–3.
16. Bracchi, Paul (June 10, 1994). "The Missing Word". Evening Argus. Brighton, UK. pp. 1, 4–5..
17. Court Injunction, Hodkin v. Atack, May 18, 1995, 1993 H. No.2412.
18. "Amazon.com Backs Off Book Ban", Associated Press, May 21, 1999.

Further reading

• A Piece of Blue Sky at Open Library
• jonatack.com, Jon Atack's website, accessed July 15, 2010.

• Books

• 1990 non-fiction books
• Books about Scientology
• Books critical of Scientology