The Butterfly Thief:
adventure, empire, and Australia’s greatest museum heist
Out now in Australia, the United Kingdom and United States via Scribe Publications
In January 1947, a chance discovery rocked the world of natural science: over 3,000 rare and precious specimens of butterflies had vanished from Australia’s most prestigious museums in Sydney, Melbourne, and Adelaide.
On the other side of the world, New Scotland Yard descended on a country house in Surrey, where they found a trove of over 40,000 butterfly specimens. The culprit was Colin Wyatt, a Cambridge-educated ski champion, mountaineer, wartime camouflager, artist, and amateur naturalist whose high-flying exploits cut a path from the Alps of Europe to a London court room to a final expedition to the jungles of Guatemala.
Drawing on unpublished case files, dossiers, and private archives, The Butterfly Thief pieces together Wyatt’s enigmatic life story and his decades-long impact on the world of natural history. Along the way, award-winning journalist Walter Marsh reveals a deeper history of gentleman explorers, scoundrels, and grave-robbers that begs an uncomfortable but vital question: What if Western museums were crime scenes all along?
‘In The Butterfly Thief, Walter Marsh follows the trail of Colin Wyatt, a mysterious 20th-century collector who becomes a lightning rod for the tangled legacies of empire, science, and obsession. With wit and wonder, Marsh turns one man’s improbable story into a fascinating reflection on how history is gathered, shaped, and stolen.’
Marc Fennell, Stuff the British Stole
‘This fascinating tale of conquest, colonialism, and collecting kept me riveted from the first page to the last. Walter Marsh is a compelling and gifted storyteller, but it is his ability to reveal the intricate connections between a singularly weird and wonderful butterfly heist and the wider crimes of the West that makes The Butterfly Thief truly extraordinary.’
Hannah Kent, author of Always Home, Always Homesick
‘The Butterfly Thief is the most delicate of books that, like its insect namesake, unfurls its brilliance slowly and then all at once. This is a work filled with artefacts, curios and the ephemera of human striving teased out with the sharp eye of a writer, if not a collector. Marsh has a wry attention to detail that thrills and deploys it to wonderful effect here.’
Rick Morton, author of Mean Streak
and One Hundred Years of Dirt
‘A new genre of entomological true-crime thriller … This is a stunning and important read.’
Samela Harris, The Advertiser
‘‘The Butterfly Thief tells a story stranger than fiction … As Marsh describes in this fascinating, impressively researched and at times dismaying book.’
Simon Caterson, The Weekend Australian
‘Lovers of intrigue told in meticulous detail will be absorbed.’
The Saturday Paper
Young Rupert:
the making of the Murdoch empire
Available now in Australia, the United Kingdom and United States via Scribe Publications
In September 1953, 22-year-old Rupert Murdoch landed in Adelaide, South Australia. Fresh from Oxford with a radical reputation, the young and brash son of Sir Keith Murdoch had arrived to fulfill his father’s dying wish: for Rupert to live a ‘useful altruistic and full life’ in the media.
Drawing on unpublished archival material and new reportage, Young Rupert pieces together a paper trail of succession, sedition, and power — and a fascinating time capsule of Australian media on the cusp of an extraordinary ascension.
‘Marsh’s deep study is bedded in detailed and meticulous research rendered unfailingly lively and enthralling in the telling.’
— Jonathan Green, Australian Book Review
‘Marsh has a deft touch, with a knack for explaining the historical context, bringing postwar Adelaide to life without losing the narrative thread, all the while drawing out the contemporary relevance of the events he describes.’
— Paddy Manning, Crikey
‘A fascinating account of the early days of one of the most notoriously influential men Australia has produced. Marsh skilfully brings forgotten episodes of this country’s history to life, and reminds us just how important, cut-throat, and thrilling the news business can be.’
— Sean Kelly, author of The Game
‘Marsh has a novelist’s gift for recreating a scene, and the book is meticulously researched and elegantly written. Well worth your time even if you’ve read a lot about Murdoch – or if you feel you couldn’t stand to read one more word about him.’
— Sian Cain, The Guardian Australia
‘Marsh understands the worth of careful description: simply tell the truth about them and the worst condemn themselves.’
— Damon Young, The Saturday Paper
‘Ruthless, ambitious, a purveyor of intrigue and scandal for whom loyalty is just a pit stop on the way to a business deal, this is the young Rupert as you’ve never seen him before. A riveting, rollicking tale.’
— Jenny Hocking, author of The Palace Letters
‘From schoolboy socialist to boy publisher to mogul on the make: Young Rupert offers a revelatory glimpse of Murdoch becoming Murdoch.’
— Jeff Sparrow, author of Crimes Against Nature
‘Deeply researched and sharply written, Marsh summons a vanished era to life and chronicles the intricate manoeuvres and shifting character of a man whose whims and grudges have dominated, for better and worse, the media landscape for seventy years. This is an engrossing and insightful study of raw power, shameless politics, and the powers of the press.’
— Patrick Mullins, author of Tiberius with a Telephone
‘This is a distinguished work – essential for anyone who wants a greater understanding of Murdoch, his empire, and the contemporary history of South Australia.’
— David Washington, InReview
Walter Marsh 