Horse Racing: books tagged “Horse Racing” (2/6) @ BookFinder.com

The Danger

by Dick Francis

ISBN 0449210375 (0-449-21037-5)
Softcover, Random House Publishing Group

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Dead Cert

by Dick Francis

ISBN 0425194973 (0-425-19497-3)
Softcover, Berkley Pub Group

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Book summary:

As jockey Alan York looked at the back of Bill Davidson astride the great horse Admiral, one thing was different. Before his rival reached the last hurdle, he was dead. Alan knew racing was dangerous; he also knew Bill's death was no accident. It was the kind of knowledge that could get a man killled....
"The best thriller writer going."
THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY [via]

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ISBN 9780425197059 (0-425-19705-0, 0425197050)

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Enquiry

by Dick Francis

ISBN 0425197050 (0-425-19705-0)
Softcover, Berkley Pub Group

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Book summary:

A closed-door enquiry has found a jockey guilty of the lowest possible crime--throwing a race for money. His reputation scarred, he's begun his own investigation--but asking the wrong questions just might get him killed.

[via]

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Flying Finish

by Dick Francis

ISBN 0425205258 (0-425-20525-8)
Softcover, Berkley Pub Group

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Book summary:

Henry Grey was considered hard to get along with. But he knew a change of job was all he needed. No more part-time office work/amateur jockey races for him. So he took a new job, air- transporting racehorses to change his luck and see the world. But he saw something quite unexpected in the cargo hold....
"The best thriller writer going."
ATLANTIC MONTHLY [via]

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Forfeit

by Dick Francis

ISBN 0425201910 (0-425-20191-0)
Softcover, Berkley Pub Group

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Book summary:

James Tyrone, a racing reporter for a London scandal sheet, suspects foul play when a fellow writer, who had a penchant for drink--but was always an honest sort--dies in an "accidental" fall. Tyrone finds clues to his death in some suspicious columns touting some can't-lose horses--who mysteriously failed to show up on race day. [via]

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High Stakes

by Dick Francis

ISBN 156895008X (1-56895-008-X)
Hardcover, Wheeler Pub Inc

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Book summary:

Steven Scott may have been a successful, wealthy inventor with no experience in horseracing, but with the inspired guidance of his trainer, Jody Leeds, and the prowess of a beautiful black hurdler named Energise, he has brought home several wins. But his winning streak is about to come to a fast end when he discovers trouble in his own stablestrouble that could bring about his own termination if he doesnt watch his step&

[via]

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Horse Heaven

by Jane Smiley

ISBN 0449005410 (0-449-00541-0)
Softcover, Ballantine Books

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Book summary:

It takes a great deal of faith to gear a novel this horse-besotted to the general public. Horse love is one of those things either you get or you don't, and for the vast majority of the populace, horse stories tend to read like porn written for 13-year-old girls. The good news, then, is that while a love of all things equine is not a prerequisite for enjoying Jane Smiley's Horse Heaven, a love of human perversity is. Racing, after all, is at worst a dangerous, asset-devouring folly and at best an anachronism, as one of her horse trainers notes:

The Industry Leaders had made it their personal mission to bring horse racing to the attention of the general public, with the NFL as their model and television as their medium of choice, which was fine with Farley, though his own view was that horse racing out at the track, newspaper reading, still photography, placing bets in person, and writing thank-you notes by hand were all related activities, and football, ESPN, video, on-line betting, and not writing thank-you notes at all were another set of related activities.

A crucial piece of information for Smiley fans is that, among her many novels, Horse Heaven most resembles Moo. (And there's even a pig!) In fact, with these two books it appears that this versatile author has finally found a home in which to unpack her impressive gifts: that is, the sprawling, intricately plotted satirical novel. Her target in this case is not academia but horse racing--less commonly satirized but, here at least, just as fruitfully so. Wickedly knowing, dryly comic, the result is as much fun to read as it must have been to write.

None of which means that Horse Heaven is a casual read. For starters, one practically needs a racing form to keep track of its characters, particularly when their stories begin to overlap and converge in increasingly unlikely and pleasing ways. Perhaps it says something about the novel that the easiest figures to follow are the horses themselves: loutish Epic Steam, the "monster" colt; the winsome filly Residual; supernaturally focused Limitless; and trembling little Froney's Sis. And that's not to forget Horse Heaven's single most prepossessing character, Justa Bob--a little swaybacked, a little ewe-necked, but possessed of a fine sense of humor and an abiding disdain for winning races by anything but a nose.

Then there are the humans, including but not limited to socialite Rosalind Maybrick, her husband Al (who manufactures "giant heavy metal objects" in "distant impoverished nationlike locations"), a Zen trainer, a crooked trainer, a rapper named Ho Ho Ice Chill, an animal psychic, and a futurist scholar, as well as attendant jockeys, grooms, and hangers-on. (Not to mention poor, ironically named Joy, a few years out of Moo U and still having problems relating.) It's a little frustrating to watch this cast come and go and fight for Smiley's attention; you glimpse them so vividly, and then they disappear for another hundred pages, and it breaks your heart.

But there are certainly worse problems a novel could have than characters to whom you grow overattached. A plot this convoluted would be one, if only it weren't so hard to stop reading. There are elements of magic realism, astounding coincidences, unabashed anthropomorphism. (At one point--while Justa Bob throws himself against his stall in sorrow at leaving his owner's tiny, wordless mother behind--this reviewer cried, "Shameless!" even as she began to tear up.) Improbably, it all works. Horse Heaven is a great, joyous, big-hearted entertainment, a stakes winner by any measure, and for both horse lovers and fans of Smiley's dry, character-based wit, a cause for celebration on par with winning the Triple Crown. --Mary Park [via]

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Horse of a Different Color

by James D. Squires

ISBN 1586481800 (1-58648-180-0)
Softcover, Public Affairs

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Hot Money

by Dick Francis

ISBN 0449212408 (0-449-21240-8)
Softcover, Ballantine Books

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Book summary:

Malcolm Pembroke never expected to make a million pounds without making enemies. Nor did he expect his latest wife to be brutally murdered. All the clues suggest the killer comes from close to home - but after five marriages and nine children, that still leaves the field wide open. When he finds his own life in danger, Pembroke entrusts his safety to his estranged son, Ian, an amateur jockey; and through him discovers a compulsive new outlet for his financial expertise. Soon he's playing the international bloodstock market for incredible stakes. Not the safest bet for a man on the run from avaricious relatives. Particularly when one of them got a bomb... [via]

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Knock Down

by Dick Francis

ISBN 0425210243 (0-425-21024-3)
Softcover, Berkley Pub Group

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The National Velvet

by Enid Bagnold

ISBN 0694015792 (0-694-01579-2)
Softcover, Harperfestival

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The National Velvet: ISBN 0694015792 (0-694-01579-2)
Softcover, Harperfestival

Nerve

by Dick Francis

ISBN 0425206300 (0-425-20630-0)
Softcover, Berkley Pub Group

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Book summary:

Mysterious accidents start happening to jockeys, one man is found shot dead, while another is found with a broken leg. When Robb Finn begins investigating, he finds himself caught up in a world of violence and twisted envy. [via]

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Picking Winners: A Horseplayer's Guide

by Andrew Beyer

ISBN 0395701325 (0-395-70132-5)
Softcover, Houghton Mifflin

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Book summary:

A classic. Beyer invented Beyer Speed Numbers which are included in the DRF. Thie book tells the tale of how he developed and used them. [via]

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The Race for the Triple Crown: Horses, High Stakes, and Eternal Hope

by Joe Drape

ISBN 0802138853 (0-8021-3885-3)
Softcover, Grove Pr

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Risk: Library Edition

by Dick Francis

ISBN 1568492812 (1-56849-281-2)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books

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Book summary:

A crime novel set in the world of horse racing, in which an amateur steeplechase jockey finds himself the target of a vicious persecution for which there appears to be no reason. [via]

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Second Wind: Library Edition

by Dick Francis

ISBN 0425206777 (0-425-20677-7)
Softcover, Berkley Pub Group

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Book summary:

Dick Francis's legion of admirers can relax: his year off from writing since the 1998 publication of Field of Thirteen is over, and a new vigor has entered his style. Longtime readers will be happy to find the customary racetrack skullduggery, galvanized by some fascinating new elements.

The very opening of Second Wind signals something new, with Francis's protagonist, meteorologist Perry Stuart, fighting for his life as he flies through the eye of storm on Trox Island, a blighted place steeped in guano and harboring a nasty secret. "But now, as near dead as dammit, I tumbled like a rag-doll piece of flotsam in towering gale-driven seas that sucked unimaginable tons of water from the deeps ...."

When the reader encountered details of the racing world in Francis's earlier thrillers such as Whip Hand and Reflex, they had the satisfying ring of authenticity. The same is true in Second Wind--Stuart's character was developed with the help of BBC weatherman John Kettley.

Although this is a new venue for Francis, he still has a knack for quickening the reader's pulse with a few carefully chosen words: "Despair was too strong a word for it. Perhaps despondency was better. When they came for me, they came with guns." --Barry Forshaw [via]

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ISBN 9780425196731 (0-425-19673-9, 0425196739)

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Slay Ride

by Dick Francis

ISBN 0425196739 (0-425-19673-9)
Softcover, Berkley Pub Group

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Book summary:

When a champion jockey disappears--right before a big race and the birth of his child--Investigator David Cleveland bets on foul play.

[via]

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Smokescreen

by Dick Francis

ISBN 0792716639 (0-7927-1663-9)
Softcover, Chivers North Amer

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ISBN 9780425199831 (0-425-19983-5, 0425199835)

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Trial Run

by Dick Francis

ISBN 0425199835 (0-425-19983-5)
Softcover, Berkley Pub Group

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Book summary:

Randall Drew is sent to Moscow to investigate threats against a royally-connected candidate for the Moscow Olympic games. His brief is vague, the opposition invisible and the stakes appallingly high. [via]

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Whip Hand

by Dick Francis

ISBN 0425203549 (0-425-20354-9)
Softcover, Berkley Pub Group

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Book summary:

This "convincing and memorable"mystery is "among Dick Francis's best," says the Cincinnati Post. And we're sure readers will agree.

Ex-jockey and private investigator Sid Halley is approached by the wife of an elite racehorse trainer, begging his help in figuring out why her husband's most promising horses have been performing so poorly. At first Halley thinks she's overreacting and the losing streak is just dumb luck. But now he's beginning to think it's something far more dangerous...

* A New York Times bestselling author whose reputation is virtually unmatched among modern mystery writers

Another "first class"* thriller from the New York Times bestselling author of Field Of Thirteen.--Baltimore Sun [via]

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