Review by Macaria81 -- Betrayal of Justice by Mark M. Bello

[Macaria81]

[Following is a volunteer review of "Betrayal of Justice" by Mark M. Bello.]

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1 out of 4 stars

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Betrayal of Justice, a legal-political suspense novel by Mark Bello is the second book in the Zachary Blake Betrayal series. In this book, Ronald John, the newly-elected president of the United States is pushing forward with immigration policies that threaten to deport American-born Muslims and halt immigration from predominately Muslim countries that support terrorism. Arya Khan is a Muslim-American woman wrongly accused of killing white supremacist. She hires attorney, Zachary Blake, to represent her and prove her innocence despite seemingly overwhelming physical evidence. Betrayal of Justice is an obvious attack on the Trump administration. Bello’s strong and obvious left-leaning politics, combined with a simplistic plot, makes the outcome of this story fairly predictable.

It’s hard to classify this book as suspense or a thriller because there are few plot twists. Arya’s innocence is laid out clearly from the beginning and we know who the murderer is. Her parents face possible deportation, so that is an unknown…sort of. The only element of suspense is whether the evidence of her innocence will come to light, whether her parents will be deported, and whether the true killer will be found and brought to justice. The answers to these questions are not hard to figure out because the main purpose of the book is not to entertain, but to inform the reader of Bello’s political views. It becomes clear as the book continues that almost everything that happens is a means to that end.

I didn’t get to know any of the characters well enough to care about them. The dialogue is not believable; at times I would describe it as cheesy. We are told, not shown, how characters feel or think. There are a lot of very long and boring monologues/speeches which seem to exist merely so that author may beat into the reader’s head what he thinks about religion and conservative policies. Bello even uses Zachary Blake (in a scene where Blake explains things to his teenage stepsons) to dumb down and simplify his opinions for the masses without seeming condescending; and he is very condescending.

This story had the potential to be interesting. Bello has ample legal expertise and described how the law works in great detail. I learned some about forensics, such as how to preserve a footprint and all of the information that can be obtained just from a footprint! Bello also does a good job describing court proceedings, but the interesting information is drowned out by all the excessive monologues and hard to believe character interactions.

Conservatives probably won’t like this book, and I don’t think liberals will either. With a twisty plot and some characters readers could connect with and care about, Bello could perhaps persuade some readers to see things his way. Instead, he just preaches his political views via poorly developed characters and a predictable story. In the end, a good story is a good story regardless of personal beliefs; this simply was not a good story. For these reasons, I give Betrayal of Justice 1 out of 4 stars.

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Betrayal of Justice
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