New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, (2002). First edition - A study of the five Central Asian republics - Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan - which were part of the Soviet Union until its collapse in 1991. Although rich in both cultural heritage and natural resources - including massive oil reservoirs - Central Asia remains desperately poor and frighteningly volatile. Religious repression, political corruption, and the regions extreme poverty (unemployment rates exceed 80 percent in some areas) have created a fertile climate for militant Islamic fundamentalism. Maps, notes, glossary, index. xiv, 271 pp.

New York: Harper Collins, (2004) dj. SIGNED hardcover first edition - A fascinating account which begins "with her assignment as a Fulbright Professor teaching journalism in Kyrgyzstan, , , , in the heart of Central Asia -- a place of dilapidated apartments, bizarre food and demoralized citizens clinging to the safety of Brother Russia. But when she refuses to join the other expatriates evacuated from the "-stans," it turns into much more. She flies into Afghanistan just as the Taliban are departing, mingles with tense Iraquis watching the gathering storm clouds of an American-led invasion and becomes the target of the resentments of the old comrades of the former Soviet Union." SIGNED on the title page. 321 pp. Map endpapers. ISBN: 0-06-0524421.