Fairfax--once a great Australian media company--faces a grim future. Newspapers worldwide are faltering in the face of competition from the internet, but the fate of Fairfax stands out as being particularly cruel. The carnage is barely credible.

Massive printing plants are being dismantled. Hundreds of fine journalists have been ushered from the building. The newspapers themselves are on notice. The future of the company is shaky.

Fairfax: The Rise and Fall is a story that is book-ended by young Warwick Fairfax and Gina Rinehart--the eccentric beneficiaries of two of the greatest family fortunes Australia has ever seen. But the real players in the Fairfax saga are the business and political giants. They include Kerry Packer, Rupert Murdoch, Conrad Black, John Howard, Paul Keating, Neville Wran, David Gonski, Roger Corbett and Fred Hilmer. The once-mighty Fairfax has been a victim of them all.

Colleen Ryan gives the definitive account of the fate of Fairfax, a drama-filled saga that reveals how far Fairfax has fallen.