A THRILLER that takes place across the globe features not only a lead character from the author's native Barry, but also scenes that take place in the town.

Dead Centre, a political thriller about a terrorist agency being run from a farm in Wales, takes in Rhoose airport and even Barry's Master Mariner pub alongside exotic locations such as Baghdad and Thailand.

The international tale is penned by an international man in 59-year-old Owen Jones who was born and raised in Colcot before moving to Portsmouth to study Russian at 18-years-old.

From there he moved to the Netherlands where he lived for 10 years before returning to Barry to work for his family's construction company Marlyn Construction.

At the age of 50 Owen moved to Thailand to live with a Thai woman he had met while on holiday. He married the woman and now lives in remote northern Thailand from where he has written 23 novels and novellas.

Owen describes Dead Centre, which was published last week, as "an exciting story that will have you on the edge of your seat and make you think again about many aspects of criminality that you have taken for granted."

He said: "It is a truly international story that takes the reader to Baghdad, Marseille, Essen, Belfast, New York and London, Wales and Thailand.

"It follows how the seven operations are planned and carried out and how the seven police forces and the SAS work to uncover and stop the people behind the bombings, piecing it together bit by painstaking bit."

While in Thailand Owen has also written another book called Behind the Smile, which is the story of Lek, a bargirl in Pattaya.

Dead Centre is available digitally for Kindle at Amazon.co.uk and in paperback from www.createspace.com