Tim Noakes: The Quiet Maverick

A dissident scientist, a disrupted media … On 5 February 2014, world-renowned scientist Tim Noakes fired off a tweet into a highly volatile media space; the fallout threatened to destroy his career. This is the untold backstory. Veteran journalist and writer Daryl Ilbury unveils, layer by layer, a combustible mix of ignorance, suspicion and academic wrong-doing, played out in a highly disrupted media space, where consumers demand snappy answers to highly complex questions. It’s the story of society’s historical distrust of science, the fractious relationship between science and mainstream media, the intricacies of human nutrition, and the brutal fallout when a soft-spoken scientist with a taste for social media and a flair for challenging convention voiced his maverick opinion. Featuring exclusive interviews with Noakes, as well as with people who have worked closely with him, including former Springbok coach Jake White and polar swimmer Lewis Gordon Pugh, as well as award-winning journalists and fellow scientists and academics, some of whom now consider Noakes dangerous and out of control, this book promises to be as controversial as the man himself.