New York: Pantheon, (2003.) dj. SIGNED hardcover first edition - In 1960 the Aral Sea was the size of Lake Michigan, a huge body of water in the middle of the deserts of central Asia; by 1996 it had shrunk to 1/3 its former size and it continues to shrink. A fascinating look at the people and land of Uzekhistan, including the ancient silk road cities of Samarkand, Tashkent and Bukhara, but ultimately a sobering account of an incredible ecological disaster. SIGNED and dated on the title page. Glossary, bibliography, index. Map endpapers. 388 pp. ISBN: 0-375-421300.

New York: Dodd, Mead, (1974) dj. Hardcover first edition - An account of Fax's trips first to African - to Uganda, Northern Sudan, Ethopia, Tanzania - and then to Moscow and the then Soviet Republic of Uzbekistan. "In each of these exotic areas, so different in many respects, he was to find the history of oppression by colonialism, as it had occurred in similar ways among his own people at home. Everywhere he went the artist in Elton Fax recorded with beautiful drawings, even as the text did in words, what he saw with his own discerning eyes to produce a fascinating parts of the world." Illustrated with drawings by the author/artist. Index. x, 203 pp. ISBN: 0-396068421.

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.