Without Hesitation-Mark Rosendorf

Without Hesitation
Mark Rosendorf
L&L Dreamspell, Feb 2010, $17.95
www.lldreamspell/com
ISBN: 9781603182126

After the mercenary Duke Organization liberated her from Brookhill Children's Psychiatric residence leaving behind a trail of corpses, Clara Blue felt she finally had a family who accepted her. Then that punk mercenary Jake Scarberry took them down killing her hero Rick Rasner (see The Rasner Effect). Now she is back at Brookhill and still hating the joint, but her attempts to escape fail. Instead she increasingly becomes delusional as she spends her time in the padded cells.

While Jake works as a bouncer, Rasner’s co-leader and girlfriend, Jennifer Duke, daughter of the founder of whom she and her dead lover killed, arrives at Brookhill. Clara feels Jennifer has come to take her out of the zoo, but instead the woman accepts a job as a therapist and begins to arm the inmates while encouraging her mentee to avenge those who harmed her in her second stint. Jennifer obsesses over one goal: to kill Jake. So a a second bloodbath occurs she demands he be sent inside Brookhill. Although a civilian, Jake readily agrees as the Duke Organization killed his brother years ago so sending one more to hell is all the motivator he needs.

This is an exhilarating action-packed blood and gore thriller that never stops for a moment until the final confrontation. As in the first tale, fans will root for the hero while looking forward to the High Noon war of revenge between Jake and Jennifer as much of the fascination is how similar their needs are though hey are adversaries who loathe each other. With a strong cast especially inside the facility and once again with a nod to Clockwork Orange, fans will relish the return to Pennsylvania while newcomers will want to know what the deadly Rasner Effect was.

Harriet Klausner