Amazon.com Product Description (ISBN 080707277X, Hardcover)

The first biography of a journalist, publisher, and power broker so influential in the oil world that she was called the midwife of OPEC

Wanda Jablonski began her career as a "copyboy" at a time when women were rarely hired as business reporters and came to wield extraordinary influence over the oil industry from the 1950s through the 1980s. Tenacious and glamorous, Jablonski talked her way into exploration sites in Middle Eastern deserts, drilling camps in the Venezuelan jungle, male-only boardrooms in London, and even the king's harem in Saudi Arabia.

With her gift for pulling explosive secrets out of otherwise laconic men, Jablonski challenged the control of the corporate oil titans and became the most powerful woman in this most powerful of industries. Through her shrewd use of scoops and her extraordinary access to key executives and politicians, she shaped the debate that led to the creation of OPEC, the oil shocks of the 1970s, and the largest transfer of wealth in history. Rubino uses exclusive access to Jablonski's private papers, newly declassified information, and scores of interviews to tell the high-flying story of this journalistic pioneer.

"A riveting life story that illuminates a whole era—an era that continues to have so large an impact on our own times."
—from the Foreword by Daniel Yergin, author of The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money and Power, winner of the Pulitzer Prize

"Part detective story and part political thriller, The Queen of the Oil Club is the true account of the most influential woman of the early oil age. It's a book you can't miss."
—Gregg Easterbrook, author of The Progress Paradox