Book Review: Betrayals by Kelley Armstrong

Betrayals
Author: Kelley Armstrong
Series: Cainsville
Publication: Random House Canada (August 9, 2016)

Description: The exciting fourth novel in bestselling author Kelley Armstrong's "impossible-to-put-down" Cainsville series.

When Olivia's life exploded--after she found out she was not the adopted child of a privileged Chicago family but of a notorious pair of convicted serial killers--she found a refuge in the secluded but oddly welcoming town of Cainsville, Illinois. Working with Gabriel Walsh, a fiendishly successful criminal lawyer with links to the town, she discovered the truth about her parents' crimes in an investigation that also revealed the darker forces at work in the place that had offered her a haven. As if that wasn't enough, she also found out that she, Gabriel and her biker boyfriend Ricky were not caught in an ordinary sort of love triangle, but were hereditary actors in an ancient drama in which the elders of Cainsville and the mysterious Huntsmen who opposed them had a huge stake.

     Now someone is killing street kids in the city, and the police have tied Ricky to the crimes. Setting out with Gabriel's help to clear Ricky's name, Olivia once again finds her own life at risk. Soon the three are tangled in a web of betrayals that threatens their uneasy equilibrium and is pushing them toward a hard choice: either they fulfill their destinies by trusting each other and staying true to their real bonds, or they succumb to the extraordinary forces trying to win an eternal war by tearing them apart.

My Thoughts: In this fourth book in the Cainsville series, Olivia find herself investigating the case of the deaths of some lamiae who look like teenagers and who need to gather energy from humans usually through sex. There is apparently a rogue huntsman who is tracking them and killing them.

Olivia is also trying to get her father Todd released from prison although she knows that it will probably be necessary to get her mother Pamela released. The problem is that Pamela is guilty of the crimes for which she was convicted by Todd is not. Pamela made a deal with the Cwn Annwn to kill evil people they could not and in return they would make a deal to cure Olivia's spina bifida.

Olivia, Gabriel, and Ricky are also still dealing with a love triangle that began centuries earlier. They are the current incarnations of those ancient lovers. All of them are determined not to reenact the original story. But they are still trying to figure out what their relationships should be in this lifetime which is complicated by the fact the Gabriel was so damaged by his abusive childhood.

The theme of this one is the question of what a person will do for love. Is it justified to do horrible things to achieve a good end? Olivia wrestles with this question both in her case and in her relationship with her mother and doesn't really come to a conclusion.

I enjoyed that many complex relationships in this episode of the Cainsville series and look forward to reading more.

Favorite Quote:

That kiss was a blazing fire in an ice storm. It was a clear running stream in a desert. And yet it wasn't quite that. It was finding something you didn't know you wanted, didn't know you needed, and then suddenly it was there, and you couldn't believe you hadn't been looking for it all along.

I bought this one. You can buy your copy here.