Mark Weston

MARK WESTON Mark Weston’s new book, Prophets and Princes – Saudi Arabia from Muhammad to the Present, was published by John Wiley & Sons in the fall of 2008. Britain’s New Statesman magazine called it “always intelligent,” and Saudi Aramco World magazine said Weston “writes sensitively about the post-9/11 era.” While researching his book, Weston was a Visiting Scholar at the King Faisal Center for Research and Islamic Studies in Riyadh. Weston’s interest in the Muslim world began when he lived in Lahore while writing his first book, The Land and People of Pakistan (HarperCollins 1992.) The Los Angeles Times called Weston’s second work, Giants of Japan: The Lives of Japan’s Greatest Men and Women (Kodansha 1999) “a superb new book.” Foreign Affairs called it “vivid, an excellent introduction to Japanese history.” Walter Mondale wrote the foreword, and the book went into paperback in 2002 and again in 2008. Weston grew up in Armonk, NY and graduated from Brown University with a B.A. in history. He spent a year at the London School of Economics, then earned a law degree from the University of Texas. He has been a lawyer for ABC Television and a journalist for ABC News, and has written articles for The New York Times, The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times. His one-character play, “Meet George Orwell,” has been performed Off-Broadway and at the Kennedy and Johnson presidential libraries. In 1991 Weston won enough money on TV's Jeopardy! to start a company that makes geographical jigsaw puzzles for children. He sold his firm to a larger puzzle company three years later, then lived with a Japanese family in Tokyo to research his second book. He has also written a children’s book, Honda: The Boy Who Dreamed of Cars, that Lee & Low Books published in 2008. Early in 2013 he will release a TV news game, Scoop!, as an app for the iPhone, the iPad and Android. Weston gives lively talks on the Middle East, Japan and the U.S. presidential election system. Venues have included the White House Fellows, the Middle East Institute, the Toyota Motor Corporation, and Columbia and Rice Universities.P.O. Box 892, Armonk, NY 10504