Kees Versteegh

This was an excellent, well researched book. It was full of history, which added context to the discussion of the dialects, and despite being a speaker, I found it full of new information. Personally, I enjoyed most the parts on the mass bedouin migrations to Egypt and the Maghreb, the story of the Banu Hilal and the Banu Sulaym, and the great amount of information on Bedouin migrations, which help explain how certain characteristics spread.
A basic knowledge of Arabic is definitely required, show more or it will be a tedious book to complete, and I would also say that a knowledge of linguistics would also be helpful, as the book is filled with linguistic terminology such as dipthongs, verbo-nominal compounds, infinitives, suffixes, subjunctives, etc. It would have been useful to have a glossary at the end.
The only drawback of the book is that all of the Arabic is transliterated into English. I would have found the book much easier if the words had been left in Arabic. For the next edition, I would recommend keeping the words in Arabic, and adding footnotes to the bottom of the page with the English transliterations for those who need them.
All in all, an excellent non-Arab study into the language.

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This book is a "must have" for the Arabic linguist. Well-researched and provides a solid background on the history and development of the Arabic language. I picked this up in Monterey, California back in 1998 and have found it to be a valuable addition to my collection.