Scribe acquires book on cancer-treatment hoax

Scribe has acquired world rights to The Woman Who Fooled the World, by Beau Donelly and Nick Toscano, the two Fairfax Media journalists who extensively covered the Belle Gibson story. Gibson claimed to have recovered from terminal cancer by making radical lifestyle and dietary changes, as a result of which she rose to social media stardom and became a hero of the ‘wellness’ world. Gibson raised funds from the public for her charity, and secured deals (later rescinded) with Apple and Penguin.

Scribe’s publisher, Henry Rosenbloom, said, ‘This promises to be a great work of extended investigative journalism. It will tell a jaw-dropping story of extraordinary deceit that left many victims in its wake and travelled around the world.’

Scribe plans to publish the book in late 2017.