I have made my book of short stories THE GULF Reaping the Whirlwind a free download on Amazon’s Kindle for 5 days starting Monday 25th September.

I have done this because I believe that although first published in 2011 it has now become relevant again.

The book is a series of linked short stories supposedly written by a journalist featuring the ex-patriate human flotsam and jetsam that washup in the Arabian/Persian Gulf working in the oil industry.

The principle thread that runs through the stories is a critique of a soulless Western society that has forced these people to abandon their families in order to find employment and survive. But the underlying thread is the destructive effect that the discovery of huge deposits of strategic oil, and the consequent flow of billions of dollars of petro-dollars, has had on the region.

When I worked in Iran in the 70s my young Iranian trainees were keen to educate me about how the CIA engineered a coup to oust Mossadeq, the democratically elected Prime Minister, and install the corrupt Shah and his cronies, so that America could control Iranian oilfields.

And more recently, when I worked in Saudi Arabia, my young Saudi trainee engineers were keen to tell me that Israel, backed by the USA, were intent on taking over not just Gaza and the West Bank, but the whole of the Middle East and its oil wealth. And just look at recent events. Not just the appalling invasion of Gaza, but the bombing of Iran, Syria, Iraq, Qatar and Yemen.

I leave it to your judgement.