Dune Devils is a multi-genre novel with roots in investigative journalism. While exposing a cruel and criminal society, it transforms seamlessly into a true-crime thriller.
The novel is a thriller at many levels, over and over, but it is the main storyline - the exposé of a real scam being operated by a major bank - that makes it an out-and-out page-turner.
Carl Snyder, CEO of Citizenbank, opts to use Dubai to launch the greatest credit card fraud ever perpetrated by a bank. When the scam is uncovered by Al, a customer, his threat to expose it degenerates into a tussle between rich and poor, powerful and weak, well-connected and unknown. The struggle then develops into a life-and-death game in which Snyder forces Al and his lovely girlfriend, Tatiana, into hiding.
As the scam is implemented in DUBAI - the city that cheating built - it becomes necessary to give background information on how such extraordinarily vile activities might have been undertaken by Citizenbank. The key to that is the secret nature of Dubai, known to all its residents as THE refuge of global criminals, and a center of human rights abuse!
In this dark and disturbing reality-based story of exploitation, rape, torture and murder, Dubai is flipped over and its horrific underbelly is exposed, revealing a coterie of criminals dealing in drugs, laundering money, exporting terrorism, and committing heinous crimes against humanity.
Dune Devils is a hard read by any standards, though without graphic violence in it. The cover depicts elements of possibly the vilest publicly-conducted crime in the history of humanity - the kidnapping of toddlers to place as jockeys on racing camels! Beaten, starved, and abused horrifically through all of their short lives, the racetracks would end up maiming and killing those that made it that far.
But hidden inside this chronicle of horror lies a surprisingly tender love story, recording the fierce loyalty of lovers as they battle terrifying odds to establish the supremacy of good over evil. And all the while the bankers, determined to silence them forever, play a deadly cat-and-mouse game...
And the reviewer up on top got it wrong. The author has merely reported the facts, supported by impeccable reference notes, revealing what beasts would keep secret.
Getting the information might make hard reading, but turning a blind eye makes complicit!
