Shortly before 5pm on Saturday 1 September 1928 Europe gained a new kingdom and its only Muslin king: 32-year-old Zog I of Albania. Zog I was a crucial figure in modern Albanian history, creating - or attempting to create - national and cultural identity for a country that had known little stability or sense of identity since the middle ages. He was also the most unusual monarch of the 20th century, described by contemporaries as: "a despotic brigand"; "the modern Naploeon"; "Mussolini's lackey"; "the finest patriot"; "frankly a cad". This biography shows Zog as the product of a unique time and place. People who live in secure, stable countries are invited to set aside their assumptions about European monarchy and meet a king who fired back at assassins and paid his bills with gold bars.

The first political biography of King Zog and his times, in English, has become the standard work on interwar Albania.

King Zog was a curiosity, and so he has remained: the most unusual European monarch of the twentieth century, a man entirely without royal connections who created his own kingdom. By contemporaries, he was variously labelled 'the last ruler of romance', 'an appalling gangster', 'the modern Napoleon', the finest patriot' and 'frankly a cad'. Even today his reputation is disputed, but Zog was undeniably one of the foremost figures in Albanian history. Though notorious for cut-throat political intrigue, he promised to bring order and progress to a land that had long known little of either. 'It was I who made Albania,' he claimed.

The Second World War in Europe has generated more literature than perhaps any other event in modern history. Much of the interest has focused on military history, occupation policy, puppet governments, and resistance movements in Europe's principal states. Often ignored in this flood of material, however, are the small nations of southeastern Europe. Yet in the small states the human suffering was no less profound, the destruction no less devastating, the heroism no less laudable, the treachery no less despicable, and the impact no less profound. Albania at War reviews the most important developments in Albania from the Italian invasion of the country in 1939 to the accession to power of the Albanian Communist Party and the establishment of a "people's democracy" in 1946. Fischer analyzes in great detail Italian goals and objectives in Albania and explains the eventual failure of Rome's policy, the subsequent German invasion of the country against the Axis Powers. This unique path breaking book provides a vigorous and thought-provoking analysis of competing external interests in Albania and explores the great obstacles that the Albanians faced in regaining their independence at the end of the war. Albania at War, 1939-1945 thoroughly covers the developments in Albania during that turbulent period. It is essential reading for all students of Albanian history.

The first full analysis of the international thought of the British statesman A. J. Balfour (1848-1930).