She Treads Softly: The Medusa Protocol

Wednesday, June 18, 2025

The Medusa Protocol

The Medusa Protocol by Rob Hart
6/24/25; 320 pages
Penguin/Putnam
Assassins Anonymous #2

The Medusa Protocol by Rob Hart is a very highly recommended thriller and the second book in the Assassins Anonymous series. This is a great series for anyone who enjoys action-packed plot with a good dose of humor.

Mark, formerly the killer known as the Pale Horse, now runs a 12-step Assassins Anonymous' group that helps killers recover from their violent ways. He is the sponsor of Astrid, known in her assassin days as Azrael. When Astrid stops showing up to the group, Mark is concerned, but when a pizza with olives on it is delivered to their meeting he knows it's a sign from her that something is wrong. This is immediately proven true when a group tries to attack Mark and his fellow AA members, Booker, Ms. Nguyen, Valencia and her baby Lucia at their meeting. After taking care of them, Mark and Booker set out to find Astrid.

Astrid hasn't relapsed into her assassin lifestyle. She has been abducted and is being held prisoner at a complex on a remote island teeming with poisonous snakes where a doctor is performing tests on her. What she doesn't know is what the tests are and who is financing them.

Chapters follow Mark and his present day efforts to find Astrid, Astrid in captivity, and flashbacks to Astrid's past that not only show her history but may point to why she was abducted. All of the characters are portrayed as interesting, complex, and intelligent individuals. We know they all have a past, but their past also gave them some mad skills, intense training, and contacts.

The action is non-stop, the tension is high, twists abound, and the humor runs rampant on every page of this entertaining, well-written thriller. Sure, you have to set disbelief aside, but it is totally worth if for this un-put-downable, exceptional addition to the series. The plot moves along at a lightning fast pace and even the flashback sections work perfectly in the narrative. I'm hoping there is another addition to this exceptional series.

The Medusa Protocol is a perfect choice for those who like thrillers with action and humor. Rob Hart is an outstanding writer. Thanks to Penguin/Putnam for providing me with an advance reader's copy via NetGalley. My review is voluntary and expresses my honest opinion.

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John Updike's six rules for reviewing:

1. Try to understand what the author wished to do, and do not blame him for not achieving what he did not attempt.

2. Give him enough direct quotation--at least one extended passage--of the book's prose so the review's reader can form his own impression, can get his own taste.

3. Confirm your description of the book with quotation from the book, if only phrase-long, rather than proceeding by fuzzy precis.

4. Go easy on plot summary, and do not give away the ending.

5. If the book is judged deficient, cite a successful example along the same lines, from the author's oeuvre or elsewhere. Try to understand the failure. Sure it's his and not yours?

To these concrete five might be added a vaguer sixth, having to do with maintaining a chemical purity in the reaction between product and appraiser.....Review the book, not the reputation.... Better to praise and share than blame and ban. The communion between reviewer and his public is based upon the presumption of certain possible joys in reading, and all our discriminations should curve toward that end.