Literary Notes: To get right to the heart of Dubai, Graeme Wilson's Father of Dubai: Sheik Rashid Bin Saeed al Maktoum (1999) is a detailed tribute to the founder of Dubai. Arabia Through the Looking Glass (1979), by Jonathan Raban, covers the region as a whole but also has an illuminating section on Dubai.
A local perspective comes from the English translation of Muhammad al-Murr's Dubai Tales (1991), with his famed short stories fleshing a bit of colour into the place. Muhammed al-Murr is one of the most revered local writers and it is worthwhile trying to get a copy of his other famous book, The Wink of the Mona Lisa (1994).
A good pictorial look at Dubai is Ronald Codrai's mid-20th-century Dubai - An Arabian Album (1992). Kevin Higgins' The Emirates (1995) is a look at all of the United Arab Emirates and puts Dubai in clear context, while William Facey and Gillian Grant's The Emirates by the First Photographers (2002) shows the sheer scale of change in Dubai and the other emirates over the last century.
An insight into the machinations and ambitions of Dubai's ruling family comes through Jason Levin's From the Desert to the Derby (2002), a look at their attempt to train a horse to win America's richest horse race. David Saunders' The Arabian Dream (2003) is a beautifully photographed look at the development of the city, though given the pace of change, it is rapidly being dated. Rachel Pagones' Dubai Millennium: A Vision Realised; a Dream Lost (2007) is the compelling story of Sheikh Mohammed's horse ‘millennium' and offers an insight into the inner workings of the emirate.