AWW Feature & Excerpt: Sinister Intent by Karen M Davis

I am excited to introduce Karen M Davis and her debut novel, Sinister Intent, today. Karen was New South Wales police officer for twenty years. Completing her training at the police academy in 1987, Karen started her career on the streets of Newtown. She then moved on to work as a detective and undercover operative in a variety of sections, all of which specialised in the investigation of organised crime.

When Karen left the force six years ago her mother (author of twelve novels, the late Lynne Wilding) encouraged her to write about her experiences.

My review of Sinister Intent will appear later today but this morning Karen is introducing you to Sinister Intent with this exclusive excerpt. Enjoy!

Sinister Intent by Karen M Davis

My name is Karen Davis and I am a former New South Wales Police Officer. After twenty years of service where I worked as a uniform officer, a detective and an undercover officer, I retired from the police force in 2007 after being diagnosed with Post traumatic Stress Disorder. Encouraged by my mother, the late Lynne Wilding, a successful novelist, to document my real life stories, I began to write down my police experiences as a form of therapy. It wasn’t long before I had created a little book of memoirs. My mother showed this to her literary agent, Selwa Anthony, who encouraged me to draw on my real life experiences to write a fictional crime book. Sinister Intent was four years in the making and it is my first novel.

Set in the beautiful eastern suburbs of Sydney, Sinister Intent is the story of a young Detective Lexie Rogers, and her struggle to overcome a vicious knife attack that leaves her traumatised. As the newest member of Bondi Junction detectives’ office, she is determined to prove that the events of the past will not cast a disparaging light over her future. When a bikie from the Devil’s Guardians – one of the two rival bikie gangs in the area – is killed, the suspicion falls upon their enemy, the Assassins. Fearing a violent bikie war is imminent; Lexie’s first murder investigation unearths a sinister world of crime, deceit and misplaced loyalties. Fighting a growing attraction to her partner and unsure of who she can trust, Lexie forms an unlikely alliance with one of the bikies whose life is in jeopardy. However, as the stakes become personal what Lexie discovers is that she too is in grave danger. She knows too much. What follows is a frantic race against time to find a killer before the killer can find her.