Monday, December 04, 2006

Robert Vitalis' new book on Saudi Arabia


My friend Bob Vitalis is speaking at the University of Washington (Seattle) on Tuesday December 5th and at the San Francisco World Affairs Council on Wednesday, promoting his new book America's Kingdom: Mythmaking on the Saudi Oil Frontier (Stanford University Press). I've not yet read it, but I've read and heard pieces of it over the last few years, and it is sure to be incisive and witty. If my word isn't good enough, the eminent Tariq Ali recently named it as one of the best books of the year in The Guardian. Ali calls it "a devastating critique of the oil giant Aramco and how strike-breaking and racism cemented the US-Saudi relationship." More info on the book is available from Stanford University Press here.

And check out Qahwa Sada, the Middle East experts' blog-journal, run by Marc Lynch (Abu Aardvark). Tomorrow it will launch a discussion of the book with responses by Lynch, Greg Gause, and Toby Jones.

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