The Agony of Algeria

Rating:
Summary: Interesting reference book about Algeria
Review: Fantastic book about Algeria. Though it seems it is much of collection of events and analysis based on news stories and other written bibleographies. Being an Algerian and have witnessed most events discussed in this book in real life, i found Martin's interpretation are based on wrong perception. Lot of typo and repeated words. I would recommend this book as a reference to get a big picture on Algeria, but be very carefull about getting wrong conclusions. The Author often refer the reasons of conflict into Berbers and Islam. he obviously forgot that Berbers are muslims and guard islam more than anything else. the problem of Algeria lied mainly on the poor managed state, corrupted regime, and it's failure to address proper development of post indepence traumatic society. Given all these notes, I would rate this book 3 stars.

Rating:
Summary: doesn't live up to title
Review: This book was well researched and informative. The history behind Algeria's current problems is well documented in this book. I was disapointed because the title gave me the impression that the book would give me some kind of idea of what it's like to live in Algeria. From what I've read in magazines and newspapers I imagine it's pretty horrifying. The book just goes on and on about the government. Trying to understand what life is like for Algerians by reading this book is like trying to understand the U.S. Great Depression by studying the names of the men in congress at that time and how they managed their political campaigns. It reminds me of a lot of the Ph.D. dissertation type books that were forced upon me in college.

One bit of information given in this book was especially interesting, however. This is about the CIA hiring Algerians to fight in Afghanistan against the Soviet Union. This had very negative consequences on Algeria when these men returned to Algeria. It is also interesting to note that U.S involvement in Algeria has led to the current Taliban situation (a subject outside the realm of this book).