From Publishers Weekly
A non-fundamentalist Arab nation in North Africa that borders the Sahara desert, Tunisia was praised by U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan "as one of the few countries in the world that serves as an international model." History records Tunisia as the home of Carthage and of Hannibal, the general who marched elephants over the Alps along with his army. According to Geyer, modern Tunisia is no less impressive, possessing a middle class of 80%, laws that ensure every child receives an education and an impressive women’s rights record. No less than 40% of Tunisian women work, many as policewomen, diplomats, filmmakers and CEOs of major companies. Geyer sees Tunisia as "a country that works," and she backs this assertion by relating a series of conversations with various politicians and prominent academics. The reasons for Tunisia’s success are many. There have been two presidents since 1956 whose progressive policies have worked wonders for the country’s infrastructure. Foreign Minister Habib Ben Yahia cites Tunisia’s commitment to maintaining a "dialogue of all the social forces in the country" as a buffer to extremist tendencies. Student Diomande Soumaila says that the capital’s university teaches students to think independently "instead of simply following the Koran and the Prophet’s sayings." Tunisia does have a dark spot, however: a record of internal human rights violations. Occasionally, Geyer’s admiration for Tunisia’s political leadership can jar with trite observation, such as when she writes that woman "chirped like a bird in her Berber tongue" as if she were "a creature from some enchanted aviary." Fortunately, such attempts at lyricism aren’t overdone; Geyer’s journalistic instincts win out, and the reader benefits from her good analysis of a unique country. Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
A fixture in Washington, D.C.'s foreign policy salons, journalist Geyer has taken a shine to Tunisia and here lauds the country in a book she demurs from labeling as a travelogue, preferring instead the term "developmental political literature." Description of people and places is secondary to Geyer's narrative of Tunisia's relative economic success and political placidity, compared to its neighbors in the Arab world. For this she credits Tunisia's two leaders since the country gained independence from France in 1956: Habib Bourguiba, and, since that president-for-life was put out to pasture in 1987, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. The two leaders sponsored a sort of authoritarian progressivism, which has resisted the region's secular and religious radicalisms and has incrementally expanded economic and political rights. Geyer is especially impressed with women's freedom in Tunisia. Politics aside, the author imparts snippets of history back to Hannibal and evocations of Tunisia's landmarks and landscapes, but Tunisia's postcolonial political history is the soul of Geyer's work. An homage to Tunisia, this would be a useful supplement to a standard guidebook. Gilbert Taylor
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Book Description
This is the story of how one strikingly beautiful country, with few resources, geographically positioned in a notably troubled neighborhood, has achieved an economic miracle. Sensible planning, timed development, and open international policy, instigated in the 1980s, have helped to create a progressive and flourishing country against the odds. To the extent that you could easily think you were in the South of France rather than in Africa, with its cosmopolitan feel. Geyer writes that she has seen nothing as spectacular as the Tunisian development policy put into action. Accounts of the author's firsthand experiences from traveling in Tunisia throughout not only feature descriptions about Tunisia's visible achievements but also accounts of the people, their mind set, and way of life. Tunisia is a fine example of a living success story for the tourist as well as the social scientist.

About the Author
Georgie Anne Geyer is a nationally syndicated journalist and broadcaster. She has received many awards and honors, including the Maria Moors Cabot Award and the Overseas Press Club Award. She has written many articles and a number of books, her most celebrated being Buying the Night Flight: The Autobiography of a Woman in Foreign Correspondence. She has traveled extensively throughout Africa and the Middle East.

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