AQUINAS is a fast-paced, modern-day crime thriller. It tells the story of a greedy and corrupt politician, an escaped vicious and sadistic serial killer and a bitter and jaded police detective, close to retirement and looking for one last case to help bury his ghosts before he retires into obscurity. All three men are unwittingly bound together by a mysterious figure lurking in the shadows known only as AQUINAS.
The core themes of the book are revenge, obsession, deceit and redemption. There is dark humour throughout and thought-provoking situations where the characters have to decide what is wrong and what is fair - often finding that those two things can occupy the same space.
I launched AQUINAS onto Amazon in mid July 2014 with much apprehension, not knowing if this labour of love would find an audience or be ripped to shreds by critical consumers. What has happened since then has genuinely blown me away. Already, I have 20 reviews on Amazon.co.uk, all with 5 star ratings. Those who know me personally will know that I feel particularly uneasy about self-promotion and I take all praise with a large pinch of salt but the feedback I have received so far has shocked me (in a good way). Readers have sent me e-mails telling me that they stayed up all night to finish it, one said that he took the day off work just because he was desperate to know how it ended and a few have even said that AQUINAS is the best book they have ever read. Now, I know that there are better books available, written by brilliant authors with huge numbers of loyal followers but this is my first book and I had to start somewhere. It is my dream to tell people stories for a living and to entertain my readers with clever, interesting and high-intensity narrative and I hope that I will be able to start writing the sequel to AQUINAS very soon.
The general feedback is that the story carries you along on a journey that is hard to break away from. The book is presented in short, punchy chapters immersing the reader in the twists and turns of the story, urging you to read on and to find out what happens next? There are some dark passages and one or two of them are brutal but I have added nothing to merely titillate or shock.
AQUINAS will appeal those readers who like pacey crime thrillers, political dramas and suspenseful page-turners where all is not what it seems. This is not a police procedural but I think it will appeal to those who like their thrillers gritty and real. If you visit my Facebook page: ‘Alex Dawson – Author’ you will see a press article about the book which explains that there is way for eagle-eyed readers to have their names immortalised in the sequel. It is available now on amazon.co.uk and amazon.com