Between Terror and Tourism: An Overland Journey Across North Africa

For his 65th birthday, acclaimed novelist Michael Mewshaw took a 4,000–mile overland trip across North Africa. Arriving in Egypt during food riots, he heads west into Libya, where billions in oil money have produced little except citizens eager to flee to Europe or join the jihad in Iraq. In Tunis, Mewshaw visits an abandoned Star Wars movie set where Al Qaeda has just kidnapped two tourists.

Ignoring U.S. Embassy warnings he crosses into Algeria, traveling through mountain towns and seethin...