Strap yourself in for an exhilarating, crazed, sometimes terrifying, frequently bloody funny ride through one man's adventures in the oil trade. A take no prisoners approach to life has seen Paul Carter heading to some of the world's most remote, wild and dangerous places as a contractor in the oil business. Amazingly, he's survived (so far) to tell these stories from the edge of civilization. He has been shot at, hijacked and held hostage; almost died of dysentery in Asia and toothache in Russia; watched a Texan lose his mind in the jungles of Asia; lost a lot of money backing a scorpion against a mouse in a fight to the death, and been served cocktails by an orang-utan on an ocean freighter. And that's just his day job. Taking postings in some of the world's wildest and most remote regions, not to mention some of the roughest rigs on the planet, Paul has worked, got into trouble, and been given serious talkings to, in locations as far-flung as the North Sea, Middle East, Borneo and Tunisia, as exotic as Sumatra, Vietnam and Thailand, and as flat-out dangerous as Columbia, Nigeria and Russia, with some of the maddest, baddest and strangest people you could ever hope not to meet. "A unique look at a gritty game. Relentlessly funny and obsessively readable." -- Phillip Noyce, director of The Quiet American and Clear and Present Danger "A boy's own yarn from the front line of the oil industry." -- Men's Style "Paul Carter Spins a good yarn. The disburbing thig is that the yarns are all real." -- Lucire Men "A torrent of tall tales from a life less ordinary." -- The Press and Journal, Aberdeen "A fascinating and funny life story ... Well worth the read." -- Sportsladsmag.com "Full of colourful storoes and well-worn anecdotes accumulated over almost two decade working the oil rigs." -- TNT Magazine "Carter's tales are always entertaining and offer a few unblinking apercus about Big Oil seen from the inside." -- Scotland on Sunday