Dick Francis was the rider to the Queen of England for four seasons. When he retired from horse racing, he tried to write a novel about horse racing. It turned out that she was talented and developed a large number of fans around the world, including the Queen of England.
I have read many of the 40+ Dick Francis novels. I always knew that a Francis novel is going to be almost impossible to put down. In fact i read Crossfire In a day. (It was the Reader’s Digest Condensed Book version.) It was as good as all his work.
Well, to be fair, Mr. Francis had a co-author of this book, his son, Felix. However, I could not see any substantial difference in style from his other novels that I have read. Perhaps your son brought more current events, such as the main character, Tom Forsyth, being a captain in the British army, who served in Afghanistan. The story begins with his war wound, the loss of his foot, to an IED (improvised explosive device). Once released from the hospital, months later, Captain Forsyth returns to his childhood home and receives a cold reception from his mother and stepfather.
But here, the story really begins, because Forsyth quickly learns that his mother, a racehorse trainer, has been defrauded and blackmailed. The Captain becomes a detective and begins to investigate who is blackmailing his mother.
He is kidnapped and left to die. Investigate the death of his mother’s accountant. And he learns that he is in a very deadly game played by two men who appear to be upright citizens.
Horse racing is just the context of his mother’s life. The real story is in the mystery of who is committing the fraud and blackmail.
As always, Francis can tell a story. You know how to make it very interesting without getting bogged down. In his more than 40 internationally best-selling novels, he always develops the story line in a credible and consistent way.
In 1962, Francis published his first novel in 1962. The setting for that story, Dead certificate, it was the world of horse racing. For the next 38 years he wrote a novel a year, and it was only missing in 1998 (when he published a collection of short stories).
Dick Francis died in February 2010, a few months before this novel was published. Many will miss him, including me. But I still have a lot more novels to read, so he really hasn’t left us.