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The launch of the bold new work of fiction by Liberty Publishing, The Special by Ali Samejo, a corporate professional and a language and communications trainer, was a revelation of society’s darkest truths.

The novel is about crimes that nobody wants to confront. The author in conversation with Taha Kehar, the author of No Funeral for Nazia and Typically Tanya, at T2F on Friday spoke about various aspects of his book that made one cringe.

The book’s protagonist, Dr Zurain Shah, is a respected criminology professor with a secret double life. He is disgraced and imprisoned after a scandal exposes his other side. But the twist in this story comes when he is unexpectedly recruited by Inspector Akbar Khan, the man who arrested him in the first place. He needs Dr Zurain to help him solve sexually motivated crimes that the police are ill-equipped to handle. From harassment and domestic abuse to flesh rings and cults, Dr Zurain and the task force confront sinister and disturbing crimes, where justice comes at a personal cost.

The author was asked by the moderator what led him to write such a book to which he said that it was initially just one story, which later became the first case in the book. “I wanted to examine relationships that would shock you, relationships that people frown on, live-in relationships, tinder meetings, and how such relationships can turn abusive,” Samejo explained.

“My protagonist, Dr Zurain, meanwhile, is showing the world that he is like any other person, pointing out the flaws not in himself but in society. But he is really like a dark, perverted mirror to society,” he added.

When asked about the research that went into the book by Kehar, who observed that the author was neither a criminologist nor a police officer, Samejo said that there have been instances where he consulted people within the police’s crime branch.

“There is also the Pakistan Penal Code to study, though I feel that it is not fully equipped to handle all crimes, such as the spine-chilling and blood-curdling ones that are part of my book,” he said.

He also said that he is very good at writing about bad guys and their thought processes and actions. “I work on my stories using the ‘what if?’ method. For instance, there may be a character of a sports enthusiast, who may also be a cannibal,” he said.

As observed by Kehar, women are at the heart of every case in the book to which Samejo was of the opinion that there are women’s rights being violated and trampled upon all over the world, which is painful and heartbreaking. “We are seeing that in the narrative of society,” he said, adding that he also wanted to show the misunderstandings people have about the word ‘consent’.

“For instance in the aftermath of a crime involving a woman, people say things such as, ‘Why did she speak to him?’, ‘Why was she wearing this or that?’, ‘What was she doing there at that time?’ These people only stop judging victims if they are people who are related to them or whom they care about,” he said.

The moderator also observed that violence in the book can be very startling and unsettling for the reader. To that, the author of The Special pointed out that he himself felt the discomfort when writing it.

“It was unsettling for me also to know that what I am writing will unsettle others. But the characters who are being wronged in my book are human beings who need to be written about as they deserve better,” he said.

Originally published in Dawn, January 31st, 2026