David Kent, The Mesa Conspiracy

The Mesa Conspiracy

David Kent

Pocket, Jan 2005, $6.99, 384 pp.

ISBN: 0743469992

In Oklahoma City, his ex-wife chose her career over him and their deaf son Patrick so Eric Anthony raises the lad by himself. However, he leaves the lad with his former spouse because the dreaded call he expected finally has occurred. Fifty-nine-year-old Colleen Cunningham, who raised Eric, is dying from cancer. Just a few minutes away, Eric goes to say his goodbyes to his beloved relative.

Colleen shocks Eric when she tells him about his biological parents, something she never said a word about in the years she raised him. Eric learns that his full name is Eric Anthony Miles, a little about his parents, and finally she leaves him with an envelope that contains directions to a cemetery. After Colleen dies, Eric travels to the cemetery where he finds a marker with his name and that of a twin he never knew was born. Not long after that shocker, Eric finds himself in the crosshairs of domestic terrorists, a shadowy federal agency Department Thirty, and the highest echelons of DC power. Only recent Department Thirty recruit Faith Kelly can save him, but that goes against her assignment.

The second Department Thirty book is a terrific, action-packed, conspiracy thriller that never slows down once Eric visits the cemetery. Though many of the villains are stereotypical, readers will root for the bewildered Eric to somehow defeat them. This likable single father, who feels like Alice falling through the hole, gallantly struggles to understand his past that if revealed will probably lead to his extermination. Fans will read THE MESA CONSPIRACY in one delightful suspense sitting.

Harriet Klausner