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Summary
Summary
After a tragic suicide disrupts the trial of a much-loved racing figure accused of corruption--a case in which he was to testify--conscience-stricken jockey-turned-sleuth Sid Halley returns to investigate this much too convenient death. By the author of Whip Hand.
Author Notes
Dick Francis was born in Wales on October 31, 1920. Because his father was a professional steeplechase jockey and a stable manager, Francis grew up around horses, and after a stint as a pilot in the Royal Air Force during World War II, he became a steeplechase jockey himself, turning professional in 1948. He was named champion jockey of the 1953-54 racing season by the British National Hunt after winning more than 350 races and was retained as jockey to the queen mother for four seasons.
When he retired from racing in 1957 at the age of 36, Francis went to work as a racing correspondent for the Sunday Express, a London paper, where he worked for 16 years. In the early sixties, he decided to combine his love of mysteries with his knowledge of the racing world, and published Dead Cert in 1962. Set mostly in the racing world, he has written more than 40 novels including Forfeit, Blood Sport, Slay-Ride, Odds Against, Flying Finish, Smoke Screen, High Stakes, and Long Shot. He wrote his last four books Dead Heat, Silks, Even Money, and Crossfire with his son Felix Francis.
He has received numerous awards including the Silver Dagger award from Britain's Crime Writers Association for For Kicks, the Gold Dagger award for Whip Hand, the Diamond Dagger award in 1990, and three Edgar awards. He died on February 14, 2010 at the age of 89.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (4)
Publisher's Weekly Review
For his 33rd-and quite splendid-novel, Francis (Decider) adds to his usual horse-racing setting a backdrop involving feature filmmaking. As usual, though, it's murder most foul and mayhem most brilliant for this English master. In the Suffolk city of Newmarket, Thomas Lyon is for the first time directing a film featuring an American megastar. Based on a bestselling book, the movie concerns a still unexplained, 26-year-old death by hanging of a young horse trainer's wife. The wife's sister, niece and nephew are vehemently opposed to the film, while the book's author, who's also the screenwriter, is opposed to any changes in his plot. The megastar's double is attacked, a murder occurs, Thomas gets death threats and finds himself in great peril. How Francis has him solve the assorted mysteries and achieve a satisfactory ending for his film is nothing short of dazzling. Francis puts his novel together in the same way a movie is constructed, with out-of-sequence scenes, dissolves and brilliant images. He offers wonderful set pieces and moves his large and colorful cast with the aplomb of a seasoned director. Even better, in Thomas Lyon he has created a representative of a vanishing, even endangered, fictional species: the thoroughly decent chap we care about. A tip-top thriller, this could make the best movie about movies since The Stunt Man. BOMC main selection; author tour. (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Booklist Review
After producing 34 popular novels in 32 years, it's not surprising that Francis has the formula for success down pat. He's a dependably good writer who can churn out one mystery after another and still keep them interesting. His heroes are decent, likable chaps who generally remain untarnished by the evil around them, and his writing is as unobtrusively smooth and classy as a single-malt scotch. His latest book promises to be another hit. Filmmaker Thomas Lyon is making a movie--based on a best-selling book--of a real-life tragedy in the horse-racing world. Twenty-some years ago, the young, attractive wife of a horse trainer was found hanged. Although her death was ruled a suicide at the time, Thomas' film reopens questions about what really happened. When Thomas' old friend Valentine Clark, a famous racing writer, whispers a puzzling deathbed confession about the years-old mystery, Thomas feels compelled to investigate. Problems begin to plague his film, and his life is threatened, but the mystery is too tantalizing for him to give up his quest for the truth. Another winner from this popular writer, so buy multiple copies and expect lots of reserve requests. (Reviewed August 1994)0399139745Emily Melton
School Library Journal Review
YAFrancis's fans will not be disappointed with his latest offering. Thomas Lyon is making a movie based on an event that occurred almost 20 years earlierthe hanging death of a horse trainer's young wife. Valentine Clark, Thomas's long-time friend and a prominent figure in the racing world, is dying, and while Thomas is reading to him he makes a death-bed confession. His whispered confidences relate too directly to Thomas's film to be ignored, especially as the movie set is plagued with suspicious problems and attempted murders. Despite being stabbed himself, Thomas tries to solve the past and present mysteries, produce his movie, and save his own life. Besides providing a many-faceted mystery and the author's trademark insights into the horse world, this novel offers an in-depth, fascinating behind-the-scenes view of filmmaking.Katherine Fitch, Lake Braddock Secondary School, Burke, VA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
Stealing a few hours from Unstable Times, the horsey film he's directing in Newmarket, Thomas Lyon goes to visit his friend Valentine Clark, a blacksmith/columnist dying of cancer, and becomes the reluctant repository of Valentine's confession that he killed that Cornish boy and left the knife with Derry. Cryptic ramblings, thinks Thomas, until Dorothea Pannier, the sister who survived Valentine, is savagely attacked by somebody who's been searching their house for some evidence (a book, a photo, a memorandum?) of Valentine's crime, and Thomas is threatened with death if he doesn't stop work on the film he's making, a fictionalized account of the 26-year-old hanging of Sonia Wells, whose husband, trainer Jackson Wells, the film seems to implicate in her death. There's no shortage of suspects who'd like to see the last of Unstable Times--Sonia's sister Audrey Visborough goes so far as to plant vituperative rumors about Thomas's feud with the screenwriter in a local tabloid, and the rest of the family lines up behind her to sniff their disapproval--but why would any of these prim snobs have stabbed so many people (Dorothea, her supercilious son Paul, Thomas himself) who seem to know nothing about the case? And who are Derry and the Cornish boy, anyway? The lowdown on film direction is fascinating--is there anything, however remotely connected with horses, that Francis isn't an expert on?--but the mystery is muddled and the villains muffled. Coming after the twin peaks of Driving Force (1992) and Decider (1993), this entry marks an off year for Francis and his many fans. (Book-of-the-Month Club main selection; author tour)
