Two Kings in Arabia: Sir Reader Bullard's Letters from Jeddah — E. C. Hodgkin (editor). Dispatches from a British diplomat posted to Jeddah in the 1920s and 1930s, watching the kingdom take shape. A vivid window into the era before oil transformed everything.
The Rise, Corruption and Coming Fall of the House of Saud — Said K. Aburish. A polemical but well-researched account of Saudi politics and the Al Saud family. Aburish does not pull punches. Read alongside something more sympathetic for balance.
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia — David E. Long. A solid history for readers wanting a grounded overview of how the country came to be what it is.
The Ottoman Gulf: The Creation of Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar — Frederick F. Anscombe. Academic but accessible history of how the modern Gulf states emerged from the Ottoman collapse.
Paramedic to the Prince — Patrick (Tom) Notestine. A memoir by an American paramedic who served on the personal medical team for King Abdullah. An unusual insider account of the royal household. The book is banned inside Saudi Arabia, which is reason enough to read it before you go.
Green Sands: My Five Years in the Saudi Desert — Martha Kirk. A personal account of life as an American woman in the Saudi desert in the 1980s. Dated on the social context, but vivid on the landscape and the strangeness of being a foreigner in a closed society.
The Empty Quarter — D. Marion Wilkinson. A fictional account set against the backdrop of the Saudi oil industry. Captures the vast, disorienting scale of the desert interior.