Customer Reviews

True Betrayals

5 star:		(29)
4 star:		(12)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I think Nora Roberts has a fantasy with horses and horse farms, as we've seen in her books Irish Thoroughbred, Irish Rebel and now True Betrayals which was written in 1996. Unlike the other two, True Betrayals is not pure romantic fiction but a blend of several genres. To me, it was very interesting and kept me amused and entertained for several hours.

Kelsey Byden was led to believe that her mother, Naomi Chadwick, had been dead for quite a few years and when she received a letter from her mother asking if she'd come visit her, she was an emotional wreck. It seems the real reason her mother wasn't a part of her life as she grew up was the fact that she had been in prison for killing her lover. Talk about shock value! Kelsey decides to visit her mother to try to come to terms with her emotions - Kelsey had recently divorced and just finding out her dead mother was very much alive was enough to make anyone emotionally unstable and made Kelsey question everything in her life.

Naomi has a working horse farm in Virginia and Kelsey goes to try to make sense out of her life. Sounds like a typical plot line, right? Well, sort of, but if Nora Roberts is writing it, you can bet there are a few twists and turns along the way. Like Kelsey being thrown into a situation that could result in another murder.

Can the trainer who works for her mother be the answer to Kelsey's broken heart? Can Kelsey ever trust her mother again after being deceived by her for so many years? Will Kelsey ever believe in herself again? I won't give away any of the plot, you'll have to read and enjoy this one for yourself!

I do have to say that the plot is not the part of the book that I enjoyed the most - sure there's a little mystery thrown in just to keep things interesting. Sure there is lots of romance and sorting of feelings toward the mother-daughter relationship. But what I enjoyed the most were the descriptions of the horse ranch, the surrounding areas, actual workings of the ranch, etc. Nora Roberts is first rate at painting a very vivid mental image and I found myself slipping off to Virginia and owning a ranch of my own in my imagination while reading this book. The lush green landscape, the openness of the working ranch, the racetrack - ah, it sounded like pure heaven.

The plot is very predictable: everyone lives happily-ever-after, mother and daughter are reunited, true love waits for Kelsey, etc., etc. What makes the story enjoyable is the mix that Roberts has perfected - not just pure romance, but a little mystery and intrigue also.

Kelsey Byden thought she knew her life, but was devastated when she received a letter from the mother that she thought was dead. Naomi thought it best since she was in jail for murder, but now that she is out and found a life of her own, she wants to see her daughter. When Kelsey visits her mother at her horse farm, her life changes forever. It is there that she has to come to terms with Naomi, and meets her future in Gabe.

This was a well-written book with a lot of information about horses and horse racing. The interaction between Naomi and Kelsey was very intense, but I found the character Gabe lacking.

"True Betrayals" is a fabulous book that will definitely keep you reading. Kelsey & Gabe are great main characters, both well-developed and likeable.
Kelsey has been told for her entire life that her mother died when she was a child, but she finds out differently one day when a letter shows up from her supposedly deceased mother! After getting over the initial shock, Kelsey decides to travel to her mother's thoroughbred farm in Nothern Virginia. Kelsey has to deal with her family's strong disapproval, especially from her grandmother, but decides that she really must meet the woman who gave her life. Kelsey arrives on the farm and slowly begins to bond with her mother and the handsome man who owns the neighbouring farm, Gabe. This story is full of betrayal, sabotage, romance, and excitement. Overall, a highly enjoyable read.

I'm a Nora Roberts fan and a horse-lover, so my expectations for this book were high. The book didn't disappoint, providing an entertaining story, strong characters to love and hate, and some mystery as well. Although she obviously did her homework about horse racing and the horse world, there were still inaccuracies that got in the way of my enjoyment of the story. Additionally, I found the analagies and puns about card-playing and roulette and other forms of gambling to be overbearing -- one of those times you just want to say "We get the point, OK? He's a gambler." Perhaps BECAUSE my expectations were so high, it doesn't rate 5 stars, but still it was a good story and worthy of staying in the bookshelf.

THIS WAS MY FIRST NORA ROBERTS READ! WHAT A GREAT ONE IT WAS. THE CHARACTERS ARE WELL DEVELOPED AND I FELL IN LOVE WITH KELSEY AND GABE.

IT SATISFIED MY OWN LOVE FOR THE HORSE WORLD, LOVE AND MYSTERY! I ACTUALLY CRIED IN THE END AND WAS SAD TO HAVE TO SAY GOODBYE TO THE CHARACTERS!

THIS IS A MUST READ. I ONLY WISH NORA ROBERTS WOULD DELIGHT US AND PRODUCE ANOTHER NOVEL DELVING INTO THE FUTURE WORLD OF THE CHADWICKS AND BYDENS, AND NEW SLATER FAMILY.

This book was aptly named. First, the heroine was betrayed byher family that her mother's dead, when she was actually in prison formurder. When she actually meets her mother, that's when the storypicks up. Though I like horses, the story behind horse racing never really caught my interest. There's a lot of sabotage in the horse racing industry that I never knew about. Nora made it a little more interesting to me. I felt the romance between the hero and the heroine was a bit swift. By the end of the story, the true betrayal will have you saying, "No, it can't be!" The action and drama was enough to keep me flipping the pages.

I just finished reading True Betrayals and then went and purchased two more of Nora Roberts books. The lady just keeps you wanting to read more and more. Where she gets her wealth of information is a wonder, but she certainly does a fine job. I have yet to read one of her books that I haven't loved. This one fell right in line. If the writer doesn't cry, the reader probably won't either. I wonder if these books get to her in that way. I hope she never quits. I will pass this book on to my reading friends.

True Betrayals was an exciting story with lots of romance and suspense. One of Roberts' best. It gave me an interesting look into the world of horse racing and an intriguing romance between Gabe Slater and Kelsey Byden and I am a sucker for a good romance. I have a tendency to enjoy her older work more than her current work and right now I'm reading Sacred Sins which has Ben Paris, who is maybe a bit more of a handful than Slater. All in all, a good read. One that's hard to put down.

Excellent story - a real treat and the typical Nora Roberts novel that I have come to love. If you enjoy race horses, romance, adventure and mystery, True Betrayals is your book. To summarize, 26 year-old Kelsey Byden, recently divorced, and definitely raised with the upper crust, receives a letter from a mother she thought was long dead. Her father, Phillip Byden and Grandmother, Millicent raised her to believe that her mother had died when she was a baby. Her grandmother is a hard-core social climber, expecting no less from her granddaughter. Her dad is an English Professor at Georgetown University, very kind and soft-spoken and very much under the rule of his controlling mother. Kelsey confronts her father as he admits that her mother had asked him to tell their daughter (who was only three years old at the time) she died after she was arrested and sent to prison for killing a man. The story begins to unfold as Kelsey decides to meet her mother, Naomi Chadwick, who owns a thoroughbred horse farm, Three Willows, in Virginia. There, Kelsey connects immediately, heart and soul, creating a new life, one of hard work, long days and many rewards, completely opposite the elite socially correct life her grandmother expects of her. She falls head-over-heels with the horses and begins to understand and become attached to the mother she never even knew existed. Along with this new life comes a new love, rugged Gabe Slater, a man raised on the wrong side of the tracks by a dead-beat father. Gabe is a gambler and has overcome the odds to make something of him and his horse farm, Longshot. The more Kelsey is drawn to the life of a thoroughbred caretaker, the more she is determined to delve into the somewhat vague facts of her mother's trial 23 years ago. Some things come full circle and along with the excitement of the Kentucky Derby and the race at Belmont, all leading to a Triple Crown event for one of Gabe's prize horses, Double or Nothing, comes murder, blackmail and cut throat tactics by men who are willing to do anything to win the golden purse. Connections of murder and greed begin to unravel in both past and present occurrences. True Betrayals is a story that keeps the reader hooked until the very last page. The characters are completely likeable and the storytelling comes with many surprises. It's a book that is hard to put down, leaving the reader sorry to see it come to an end.

Though I enjoyed Nora Roberts' novels, I took a sabbatical from them as too often one novel had too many similarities with the next. Needing escapism reading, I picked up some of her books again. I have found the same issue with some of the trilogies, but True Betrayals stands on its own. Characters are well developed. When trouble occurs in two of the horse farms, the culprit or culprits are not obvious and do not become apparent until revealed later in the book. There is a well developed connection between characters. I think it is one of her better novels and highly recommend it to anyone - especially Roberts fans.