Author: Celeste Hicks, International African Institute, Royal African Society, World Peace Foundation.

In recent years, technological advances, higher commodity prices and a global thirst for energy have meant that African oil and gas are increasingly in demand. Countries as far apart as Niger, Uganda, Chad, Ghana, Kenya and Tanzania are looking at the prospect of almost unimaginable flows of money into their national budgets. But the story of African oil has usually been associated with disaster - older producers such as Nigeria, Angola and Cameroon have little to show for the many billions of dollars they've earned, and oil money has been shown to fuel conflict and corruption, creating a so-called 'resource curse'. In this revealing and insightful book, former BBC correspondent Celeste Hicks questions the inevitability of such an outcome, revealing what the discovery of oil means for the ordinary Africans through original testimony from those working in the oil industries and the communities that surround them. A much-needed account of an issue that will likely transform the fortunes of a number of African countries - for better or for worse--