Cold Betrayal

Here we go again on one of J.A. Jance\’s two-ply plots. The storyline of the two separate tales is not connected in any way except for the fact that the heroine, Ali Reynolds, is involved in each. When the reader finishes a chapter of one story the next chapter jumps to the second tale, and the bouncing back and forth between stories continues throughout. It is not difficult to keep track of the two unrelated stories; however, each one could easily have been expanded into an entire book. There are not a whole lot of surprises, and it is not too difficult to guess correctly what will happen next. One tale concerns the threats and well-being of Betsy, who is the elderly grandmother of Ali Reynolds\’ daughter-in-law, Athena. Betsy turns to the local police for support when she is awakened by the smell of gas in the middle of the night, and finds the unlit burners on her stove, spewing the deadly fumes into her house. She is positive that she did not turn the burners on. The police treat the whole matter as a case of a doddering old lady who has a fading memory and turned the burners on herself and forgot to light them. No sign of someone else having been in her house is evidenced. She turns to her granddaughter, Athena, for support. Athena asks for Ali\’s help. There isn\’t a whole lot of mystery involved; however, it is a somewhat entertaining read. The plot is slow moving, and there are not a lot of twists and turns. The most interesting part of this story is the awesome spy-ware technology that was introduced in this story. A bit far fetched perhaps, but it does add a bit of exciting visualization to an otherwise really mediocre story. The second plot is interesting and has a few more twists and turns. It involves a pregnant teen and a run for her life. She is hit by a car while running away from a place that she has had to call home for all of her life. Sister Anselm, a patient advocate of a Catholic diocese and a friend of Ali\’s, is called to the hospital where the victim is in critical condition as is her baby that was just delivered. It is found that the young runaway mother is from a polygamous group called The Family. The Family elders deal with runaways in a rather brutal undemocratic kind of way. Sister Anselm is a clever and sometimes conniving little old lady. Though she may be small….do not cross her! She protects her patients and outsmarts even the most arrogant thugs! Her patient will NOT be returned to The Family. This story has a lot of sadness and abuse of women and young girls surrounding it. The storyline is a feasible one and has lots of possibility to succeed as a book of its own; however, it is almost akin to the novellas that the author has put forth the last couple of years. There is some mystery and suspense in this story, but I did not find it to be a “just gotta\’ read kind of page turning entertainment.” This storyline is one of power, greed, secrets, brutality and murder.

COLD BETRAYAL by JA Jance is a novel based on two parallel stories, one major, the other minor. I have read all 50 of Jance’s novels along with a couple of her novellas. Cold Betrayal ranks near the top; as for as the Ali Reynolds series goes, Betrayal is the best. The story starts when a pregnant woman is hit by a car on a rain-slick road near Flagstaff, Arizona. Sister Anselm, a patient advocate of the Catholic diocese is sent to the hospital to protect the mother and baby when it is discovered the patient is a runaway from a Colorado City polygamous Family. The Family affords no mercy to those who try to leave its ranks. I am of the opinion that JAJ had a cause, an agenda she wanted to project in this novel—exposing the depth of worldwide child sex trafficking. She also exposes problems that might exist in a polygamous society. The two parallel stories in the novel have no relationship other than both dwell on dysfunctional families. Ali’s husband, B., introduces us to a world of spyware technology available for private and corporate use. I was shocked at the ease of installation and concealment for this equipment. Ali draws on all of her investigative skills and resources, including Interpol, the International Police Organization, to solve the case against the bad guys in Colorado City. The author fails in the final pages when plans for a military-like operation appear to have been developed by the Keystone cops. As an aside, Jance describes the sheer beauty of northern Arizona from the red sandstone cliffs of Sedona to the snow-covered 13,000 foot mountain north of Flagstaff. I rate Cold Betrayal a strong 5-star read.

This is #10 in the Ali Reynolds series by J. A. Jance. This author is always a delight to read – fast moving, cohesive writing, usually multiple facets to the story and viirtually flawless editing. She never fails to deliver regardless of which of her four ongoing series you are reading. This story involved a runaway young woman from a weird fundamentalist group in southern Utah. She is injured and Sister Anselm calls upon Ali for help. What follows is the resolution of the woman\’s situation and the subsequent dissolution of the group. This reader does not seem to manage to read these in order but any reference to previous volumes is briefly explained. Recommended for a good mystery!

This was a good story, living up to its title. It took me a while to get a handle on who was who in the beginning — what with Ali, Athena, Anselm, and later, Agnes, Abigail, and Anne. And then later, there were the male characters there are Alton, Alvarez, Amos. And all of this happened in Arizona. In time, of course, after the story gets a good foothold in the reader’s psyche, one comes to get it settled, but it can be a little tricky in the beginning. This may seem to be trivial, but for a cold reader, just entering territory that the author has a good grip on, it matters. A small matter maybe, but a matter nonetheless. I was glad that the grandmother character was named Betsy.What wasn\’t clear was why Ali\’s mate was called merely B. I was expecting something relevant in this masking of his name, but I never gleaned anything about it in the narrative, Did I miss something? Otherwise the narrative held a good bit of suspense and as things were developed it was interesting to see how Betsy\’s dilemma meshed — sort of — with Ali\’s and her heroic episode with the large-scale criminal takedown in contrast to the elderly Betsy\’s frightening problem. A contrast of odd proportions, for sure that seemed sort of belonging to another book, maybe.

good

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