 At the time of the book's publication, Bachelard was a journalist for The Age newspaper. He began investigating the organisation in his capacity as a newspaper journalist. Bachelard's first book The Great Land Grab discussed the Wik and Mabo cases, and was first published in 1997. Bachelard became an investigative journalist with The Age in 2006, and wrote about conditions in the workplace. In April 2008, he became a senior reporter for The Sunday Age. Bachelard received Melbourne Press Club Quill Award for Best News Report in 2008, for his reporting on WorkChoices. After discovering that prior to the 2007 election the Exclusive Brethren organisation in Australia had close access to John Howard, Bachelard became interested in writing a book about the group. He researched the organisation's history, and focused on the version of the group in Australia; analysing its ties to the Liberal Party of Australia and to Howard. He spent over two years researching the organisation.
