Sandra Brown: Best Kept Secrets

Sandra Brown is the quenn of contemporary mystery/romance books. In Best Kept Secrets, Brown explores what a daughter will do for a mother that she has never known.

Raised by her grandmother it has been ingrained into Assistant DA Alex Gaither that  her mother's murder was never caught and the wrong man was convicted of her murder. Alex is determined to win her dying grandmother's love by heading back to the small Texas town to unearth the true murder. However, some of Alex's most likely suspects are within the most powerful family, who will stop at nothing to protect their business, money, family and the promise of a brand new horse racing track. Alex needs to watch her back, as she has no friends in this town, and some people would like nothing better than for her to go the way of her mother.

I normally like Brown's books, they are usually a nice contemporary mystery novel, usually with some romance thrown in, however, this book is not a favorite of mine. The book started off interesting and got right into the premise and I thought this is going to be interesting how this plays out; however, there were some many elements that did not add up and that I did not enjoy within this book that I would not recommend it.

I think that the story or premise had promise: Girl who is ophaned by a murdered mother and raised by a grandmother who essentially pushed Alex into going into law school to figure out who actually murdered her mother. I think that this had promise and I think exicuted a different way it would have been great.

I did not like Alex as a character; Whiny, selfish, irrational, grasping at straws, she was everything that the other characters within the book, only looking out for herself. Plus she is supposed to be this up and coming star prosecutor but she was not concerned about looking for tangible facts, it was more about interrogating the main male characters and hoping that they would slip up, but then also hanging out with them socially because she was attracted to them. Throughout the whole book it was pointed out more than one time that she did not have a shred of evidence, only her own beliefs based upon conversations that she had had. Alex as a character was just a disaster for me.

I did not like that Alex who is 17 years younger than the men in the story, many of whom considered being her daddy wanted to have a sexual relationship with her. I just kept getting "this is just wrong" feeling any time this occurred. This aspect was not a good focus for the book. I wish that maybe there was someone outside of the group of suspects that was helpful to her and that would have been her romantic interest, not some guy that could have been her "daddy". I don't know about others who have read the book, but i definitely had thoughts that one of the main male characters could have been her father and to have that attraction between them, just felt wrong. I really wish Brown would have taken this in a different direction.

I have liked Brown's books in the past, this was just way off basis as to what she normally has, that I was thrown off. I found the characters and story both lacking. Will this stop me from reading Brown's books? No, it was more of a disappointment than anything else.

Cheers!!!

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