The core of this book is a memoir of Dr. Young's mission to Saudi Arabia as financial adviser in 1951-52, when he helped to reform the currency and to establish the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency, in effect the central bank. He supplements that story, which is informative but quite brief, with personal impressions of the country and a thumbnail survey of its progress over the past half-century, all of which is polite, uncritical although not inaccurate, and falls somewhat short of the promise of the title.