Christina Lamb spent a year reporting on the political turmoil in Pakistan in 1989 for "The Financial Times". As a result she won the Young Journalist of the Year Award. This book analyzes her experiences in what she sees as the tragedy of Pakistan as it moves towards the 21st century - a woeful catalogue of vested interests, corruption, overpowering military and unconfident and enfeebled new democracy. She looks at the treatment of women, urban life, patronage and government, the troubled relationship with India, Afghanistan and the power of tribes and drug lords, the great game of espionage on the frontier, Benazir Bhutto and her failure to impose change and the imminent breakdown of democracy.