CONCESSIONS AND BETRAYALS

A World War II–era American oil engineer finds himself in Arabia in Wesley’s historical novel.

Hank Simmons is an engineer at Standard Oil, and though that doesn’t entitle him to free gas, it has kept him from getting drafted to fight in WWII. Instead, he has been fueling the Pacific fleet from the safety of San Francisco. The vast petroleum fields of the Persian Gulf are about to be tapped by Western oil companies, however, and there are more jobs requiring experienced engineers than there are men to fill them. He isn’t surprised when his boss makes him an offer: a three-year stint at the California Arabian Standard Oil Company, or Aramco, helping to build a pipeline between Bahrain and a new refinery at Ras Tanura. Hank takes the job without much deliberation; he’s excited to contribute more to the war effort, and, after all, One Thousand and One Nights was his favorite book as a child. On the flight to Dhahran, he meets James “Mac” MacPherson, a seasoned oilman of Scottish birth who helps Hank get his bearings in the unfamiliar desert land. As Hank sets to work, he finds himself at the center of a dizzying political situation involving American, Arab, and Italian workers as well as commercial, military, political, and religious agendas that don’t always align. The author’s prose is simple but effective, as when describing Hank’s first look at Arabia through an airplane window: “Hank and Mac took turns looking at the desert below. In the late afternoon, the only signs of life came from the drilling rigs. As soon as the Saudi crude reached the surface, its gases were being flared off. The fires looked like torches marking their descent into Dhahran.” Wesley’s attempts at drama fail to register strongly in this exposition-heavy novel that often reads more like a memoir. Even so, the book provides a rare window into the birth of one of the 20th century’s most fascinating and impactful industries: oil extraction in the Persian Gulf.

A flawed but fascinating novel about the birth of the oil industry in the Gulf states.