BETRAYAL

4 stars out of 5

After reading one other in this series featuring former MMA fighter Robin Lockwood, I looked forward to another. And I'm happy to say this one (the 7th) doesn't disappoint - if anything, I enjoyed it more. This time around, Robin is a highly regarded defense attorney in Portland, Oregon. When a local family of four is murdered, the primary suspect is Mandy Kerrigan, a washed-up MMA fighter who once roundly defeated Robin, causing her to get out of the professional fight arena. Mandy, it seems, had beaten up the grown son of the murdered family and was even seen at their door not long before the bodies were discovered.

But Robin suspects the truth is more elusive, agreeing to defend her and, hopefully, identify the real killer or killers. Among the discoveries is the fact that the mother, Margaret Finch, was an attorney with a lucrative history of defending powerful mobsters, the father owed a ton of gambling debt and the aforementioned son was a drug dealer (plenty of reasons for payback, then).

The story, which employs flashbacks, follows Robin's investigation and courtroom proceedings as well as her budding romance with a colleague. There's plenty of action, all building up to a surprising end (well, sort of; fairly early on I made a deduction on my own that proved right on the money). All told, it's a very entertaining book, and I thank the publisher, via NetGalley, for the opportunity to read and review a pre-release copy.

Betrayal by Phillip Margolin (Minotaur Books, November 2023); 303 pp.