This in-depth portrait of the Wakefield family, who played such a major role in British overseas settlement in Canada, Australia, and New Zealand in the 19th century, is written with a novelistic flavor, using personal letters and journals to bring to life this group of talented but morally complex individuals whose exploits spanned the globe, and who remain an indelible part of British colonial history.

Philip Temple won a 1996 National Library research fellowship to work on a biographical study of the Wakefield family.