Silvertail to publish Wright's Scientology exposé

Independent publisher Silvertail Books is set to publish an investigation into Scientology by Pulitzer prize-winning author Lawrence Wright, three years after it was pulled in the UK by Transworld.

Publisher Humfrey Hunter bought UK and Commonwealth rights including Australia to Going Clear, from James Pullen at Andrew Wylie.

The book will uncover the “inner workings” of the Scientology church after Wright used archival research and more than two hundred personal interviews with current and former Scientologists to write the expose.

Transworld was set to publish the title but pulled it in January 2013, with the publisher saying at the time: “We've decided it doesn't fit in with our schedule but it will be published by Knopf in the States."

The title will now be published by Silvertail on 17th March in all formats through Amazon, Silvertail's website and is available to high street booksellers via Neilsen.

The publisher said: “Scientology presents itself as a scientific approach to spiritual enlightenment, but its activities have long been shrouded in mystery and controversy. Now Pulitzer Prize-winning author Lawrence Wright – armed with his investigative experience, years of archival research, and more than two hundred personal interviews with current and former Scientologists – uncovers the inner workings of the church.

“We meet the founder L. Ron Hubbard, the science-fiction writer turned prophet, and his tough, driven successor David Miscavige. We learn about the church’s specialized cosmology and language, its legal attacks on the IRS (Internal Revenue Service), its vindictive treatment of critics, its extraordinary practices and its phenomenal wealth. We see the church court celebrities such as Tom Cruise while consigning its clergy to hard labour under billion-year contracts.

“Through it all, Wright asks what makes a religion, and whether Scientology in fact merits this constitutionally protected label.”

Wright won the Pullitzer Prize for non-fiction for The Looming Tower (Penguin) in 2007, which tells the history of Al Qaeda from its roots up to 9/11.

Silervertail also brought Bare-faced Messiah, a book about Scientology’s founder L Ron Hubbard, back into publication in February 2014.