Expert on oil, Sonia Shah speaks about her new book Crude: The Story of Oil (Seven Stories Press, October 2004). In Crude, author and independent journalist Sonia Shah presents the first concise history of this, the world's most coveted and contentious mineral. But this portrait of the fuel that defined an age is shot through with a history of destruction and conflict as myriad as oil's use. As the stakes of such dangerous engagement rises, still the frenzy for oil by worldwide producers and Western consumers ramps up. Yet crude's reign, Shah suggests, is in its twilight. With peak production in the Middle East projected in the next five to fifteen years, this finite natural resource that empowered superpowers and defined the most strategic regions on the earth, is dwindling. And the consequence for this New American Century may determine how we live in the next.
Her website is www.soniashah.com.