Regarding "Bill Atkinsons had not seen or experienced the Star": This was more aimed at the use of icons (esp. desktop icons) and drag&drop interaction on the Lisa, which emerged only late in development, when the Star was already released (introduced in April 1981). However, this was apparently a parallel development, compare this talk [0] by Bill Atkinson at 48:22. (Similarly, just before this, Atkinson mentions the very same background raster alignment problem for desktop icons, the Star had to solve. Compare "Designing the Star User Interface", cited in another comment.)

[0] Bill Atkinson, video talk, Carnegie Mellon University, Feb 04, 2019: https://scs.hosted.panopto.com/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=...

P.S.: I guess, realistically there would have been a chance to demo some preview of what became the Star interface in December 1979 (16 months before the official introduction), but this is not what was shown at the (in)famous Apple PARC tours. I guess, I'll have to buy your book, though… :-)