True Betrayals, by Nora Roberts

This weekend I reread a Nora Roberts book of which I had practically no recollections: True Betrayals.

Kelsey Byden always believed that her mother was dead. But now, after all this time, she has discovered the truth: Naomi Chadwick is still alive—after spending years in prison for the murder of her lover. Now, at Naomi's Virginia horse farm, Kelsey is trying to sort out a lifetime of deception—and her feelings about her mother. The bonds of love can be fragile…as Kelsey learned from her recently ended marriage.

But as the two women rebuild their relationship—and Kelsey finds herself swept into an unsettling new romance—she must decide once and for all who she can trust, and who threatens to betray her…

It was a B-.

This one read more like women's fiction than romance. Actually, in the first half, the romance part of the book is very, very slight. The book concentrates on Kelsey getting used to the work at the farm and coming to grips with her mother's presence. Gabe is just a presence, someone who wants Kelsey and who's wanted right back by her. It's only in the second half that their romance comes to life, and even then the love scenes are strangely undetailed and cut short, as if Nora had been trying to go more mainstream. I liked these two as a couple, but I never did get completely invested in their relationsip.

The setting, in the world of horse racing (is this the right expression?) was interesting, but unfortunately I didn't really enjoy the suspense subplot which was a large part of the book, and intimately related to the setting. Really, every time we saw Cunningham and Rich Slater I just wished they'd go away, and there was a lot about them.

Also, the ending wasn't at all satisfying. I hate it when a book ends and I feel justice hasn't been served. I guess I'm not much of a "forgive and forget" kind of person. That person, who was ultimately responsible for the deaths of people and for someone spending 10 years in jail, shouldn't have got away scot-free. And Naomi didn't have the right to decide that person shouldn't have been punished. Ok, if you want, forgive the person for what was done to you, but didn't the dead men deserve justice?