They are a bit up and down, these racing thrillers. He is obviously chasing Dick Francis, not quite catching him but he’s good fun, although this one is a little convoluted.
Not much is going right for jockey Alan Morrell. He can’t get the rides he needs and when he sets up a bloodstock partnership a tragic accident robs him of the business and his best friend Lee. Now Alan owes £100,000 and his only asset is a racehorse who has yet to be put to the test. But all that fades into insignificance next to the suspicion that Lee’s fatal fall was more than an accident…
Things aren’t looking so hot for fellow-jockey Max Ashwood either. There’s the backlash from his affair with a trainer’s wife and the little matter of his gambling. There’s also the convenient death of another man to whom Max owed money. But surely no one is ever going to find out the truth about his part in that… Two riders, two unexplained deaths – but overshadowing both is a conflict that dwarfs the cosy world of racetrack winners and losers. As the noose closes round the neck of one man's criminal empire, just how many others will swing?
Ex-National Hunt Champion Jockey John Francome is a broadcaster on racing for Channel 4 and has established himself as one of the front runners in the racing thriller stakes. He lives in Berkshire.
