Since I am working and in grad school and have four kids, I don't have much time to read mysteries, much as I love them. When I saw Lis Wiehl on Bill O'Reilly talking about her new novel, Face of Betrayal, I wanted to read it now, not wait for the short break between classes. When I managed to get my hands on an advance copy, I made time to read it right away.
I love listening to Lis's opinions and hoped her novel would feature strong, smart women like her. The three main characters, Allison, Nicole and Cassidy, are smart and dedicated, but not superwomen. They struggle with everyday life issues while doing their jobs. In this book, their jobs all relate to a missing 17 year old girl, Katie. The story is told in the present, with Katie's blog entries giving us somewhat cryptic "flashbacks". This worked very well, although one non-blog flashback confused me for a moment. It would have been better to keep with the blog format to fill in earlier information, or to reveal the information in the present.
Face of Betrayal brought up issues of politics, hypocrisy, abusive relationships and the secrets that people keep from their families and friends. That is a tall order. I wish these themes would have been more fully developed--I know it would have been a much longer book, but some issues seemed to be tied up too quickly in the end.
When I finished the book, I discovered discussion questions (I need to remember to look in the back for these, since they are more and more common). I also found that a sequel is in the works and I am looking forward to it. I would like to know more about Nicole, Allison, and Cassidy.
I just bought this book based on your recommendation here, Tracy! We'll see how much is similar in what we like to read.
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