Nancy has been fortunate to know Patrice for many years as a colleague at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln where Patrice is a professor of Political Science and director of the Honors Program. Even more important, Patrice is just a solid gold person and Nancy feels honored to call her a friend as well, having spent many dinners with their families, and coffees and lunches with their circle of wonderful friends! Patrice tells us about her Balkans fieldwork experiences and the conversations she had that informed the writing of this book. She met with staff from non-governmental organizations (NGOs), governments, and citizens to learn about the rush of peace-building activities that followed the cessation of wars in the region. What she found was disturbing. As one man from Kosovo explained, "They (NGOs) waste our time and we waste their money." Even more crippling is the inevitable "bust" when Western money they have become dependent upon dries up and the country is left with little surviving knowledge or structures to move forward. Patrice also tells us about the history of peace-building efforts and relates her experiences in the Balkans to other peace-building efforts around the globe. In the end, though, Patrice tells us she is optimistic, observing how a number of NGOs and Western governments are learning from their mistakes and are restructuring their approaches to ensure more funds are spend to build capacities among the citizenry and more care is taken in learning what is important to them and involving them in decision processes.