Date first published	1 Sept 2011
ISBN Number	0 718 15665 x
Page Count	432 h/b
h/b= hardback : p/b= paperback

Storyline

As one of the youngest ever winners of the Grand National, Nick 'Foxy' Foxton's career as a world-class jockey is on perfect track until a near-fatal accident cuts his dream brutally short. But when he returns to Aintree as a spectator years later, nothing can prepare him for what unfolds.

Minutes before the biggest event on the racing calendar, Nick's affable American colleague Herb Kovak is shot at point-blank range, the gunman disappearing amongst the stunned crowd. Along with the police, Nick is left baffled as to why anyone would want to kill such an apparently gentle soul.

With the press speculating about links to gangland crime, and with a crumpled note containing a threatening message found in the dead mans coat, Nick begins to doubt how well he really knew Herb. And on discovering Herb had named him as the benefactor of his will, Nick questions why he has been entrusted with the legacy. is this a generous gift from a friend or is it, in fact a poisoned chalice?

Review

Well it's taken me a while to acquire this book. So when is a Dick Francis Novel not a Dick Francis novel? When it's written by his youngest son.

As you can see the book sits within the Dick Francis pages at present, and I'm currently debating whether to create a whole new section. For the time being it will be a sub section, but if Felix earns the right then he will get his own section.

So enough of the waffle, was it worth the wait? The answer is a definite yes, I thoroughly enjoyed the book, cover to cover. There are very strong similarities to Crossfire, in style, and it most definitely is in the mould of his father's writing, yet there are differences in the tone and pace. It is difficult to put a finger, but it is not quite a Dick Francis novel. Perhaps a second reading will help me identify what is different (perhaps the length). Now don't get me wrong I'm not saying that differences are bad it just niggles me that i can't identify why the book is different.

It is a typical Francis style, a loan hero, reluctantly dragged into a scheme that he wishes he hadn't been. Another difference is that the hero is already set up in the love department, although in this case it will lead to further trauma.

Felix sets up two very nice possible outcomes, one of which will prove to be a red herring, even though it's technically illegal what Kovak is doing. Well illegal in American eyes anyway. i say red herring, I think red whale would be more apt, as you are drawn along a particular. It is the sign of a good author that he can take you down the wrong path. As the real reason for Kovaks death is rumbling in the background but doesn't seem that important.

Characters are the simple fleshed out beings, filled out just enough to make the story have a sense, and for you to care about what happens to the good guys, and in truth it needs little more.

It will be interesting with the second novel to see ow different the style is, as I would suggest that with a lead time of months his father would have had some input into the story.

Not surprisingly the horse racing takes a back seat, but I hope that future novels stay within the racing fraternity, as it gives it it's own genre.

To cap it off a well written novel, easy reading style, a long with a mixture of believable action, a hint of menace in the background, and a logical ending to the story. For a first solo novel I give it a definite thumbs up. In later years I may well come back to review the book. but for the moment it deserves 4 out of 5.

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