The beginning gives you the feeling you've stumbled onto an episode of Murder, She Wrote about 10 minutes after the start. Or considering all the car chases and crashes maybe The Rockford Files. The scenes revolving around the publication of Blaze and James Tyler's interactions with his co-workers were awfully dull and made me feel as if I were trapped like an invalid attached to a breathing machine.
Speaking of which, I thought everything having to do with Elizabeth and her predicament and how she unwittingly becomes involved in the crime story was riveting. I was much more involved in Ty and Elizabeth's relationship through it's various stresses than what was going on with the horses.

I always enjoy Dick Francis good story good plot.

Sportswriter James Tyrone writes about horse racing. But something odd is happening with fellow race writer Bert Checkov – whenever Bert touts a horse, the horse loses badly or fails to show up for the race. Bert drunkenly confesses to Ty that he has sold his soul; and then falls to his death out of a seventh story window.

Ty discovers there is a rigged betting scheme and the bad guys expect Ty to be the next one to fall in line. Not only does he resist, but he must protect his paralyzed wife from murder and mayhem from people who will literally stop at nothing. And then there’s the lovely Gail, whom Ty is falling in love with, although he knows he can never leave his wife.

Ty is a conflicted and complicated protagonist. Like many of Francis’s main characters he has a heroic moral sense along with intelligence and physical strength to win through solving the mystery and a beating or three. In this one we see the character’s more human side as he wrestles with the moral dilemma of choosing between his beloved paralyzed wife and a woman who could be lover, companion and equal.

Ok

The usual, really. Usual, hero, usual villans. The wife thing was a bit different and gave it an extra dimension but the ending was a but of an anticlimax. Enjoyable enough, though.

Always a good read from Dick Francis

This is my favorite so far of the Dick Francis stories. Ty is a writer whose wife is living at home, paralyzed by polio, with a newer version of pump that works like an iron lung. He of course is interested in horse racing. I realized as I read about the medical and betting practices that this was an older book. Finally checking the publication date I knew I was right (1969). However, you feel for this man and his home predicament. His wife becomes ill when they've only been married three years. It is now 11 years later. As he uncovers evidence about the horse-racing crime and is in increasing danger, the suspense is very real! An excellent book.

Another great Dick Francis book featuring the horse racing world. This time the main character is a sports news reporter known for his sensational inside stories about owners, trainers and bookies. Even though the setting is in the horse racing world, Francis finds a way to make each of the books fresh and exciting.

The writer has been asked to do a piece for the magazine Tally, and as his salary at the newspaper is barely enough to keep him and his severely handicapped wife, he is given permission to go ahead. Instead of interviewing and writing about the superstars of the sport, he realizes this has been done many times before and he approaches the story by interviewing some of the secondary characters - a couple who won a horse in a raffle, a young female groomer and a jockey who does fairly well in the background but never quite gets to ride the top horses.

A friend of his who writes for a rival sports paper falls to his death after drinking heavily in the bar where the main character, an associate and their boss are having lunch and a beverage. The drunk makes many attempts to warn the MC not to sell his soul or his column. As this seems a very cryptic warning the MC merely tries to get him back to his office without him falling down drunk or being hit by a vehicle.

The MC is not far along on his way back when the friend falls to his death. The MC rushes back to the body and then investigates his 7th floor office to see if he was pushed or simply fell. (More to come)

This one is not as in depth as some by Dick Francis but I still like it. What a silly sentence. Of course I like it. It's Dick Francis! This one felt more dated that some because the hero's wife suffers from severe polio with life threatening consequences. Most people under 50 in the developed world today have no real life acquaintance with polio. In addition to solving a case of horse race fixing, this story deals with what happens in a marriage where love is still there but all chance of any physical relationship is gone. Strength comes in many forms.

I love all books by Dick Francis and all center around horse racing. This one, however, was a story of a man who was a reporter. His wife was a victim of polio back in the days when it was so terrible. He is threatened and beat up badly several times to keep his wife safe. It is a good book.

A pleasant relief from Covid-19 lockdown. Written in 1969, it's still good.

When James Tyrone, a newspaper reporter, finds out that there are horrible crimes being committed on horses and people and noone is willing or able to try to stop it, he takes the attitude of "someone needs to stop this, and if noone else will, then why not me?" Tyrone is not an un-flawed character himself, but he risks his life and those he cares about the most to stop the downright evil men committing the crimes. This is another excellent thriller/suspense story from Dick Francis that I highly recommend.

3 Stars

Forfeit by Dick Francis is another engrossing crime and investigation story, where we follow reporter James Tyrone as he investigates the apparent suicide of a friend and fellow reporter who had been acting strangely prior to his death. James is on a mission to prove that Bert's death is actually a murder- but he could never have predicted what he eventually discovers. What happens makes for a great read. The story has plenty of action, danger, agendas, high stakes, horse racing, mystery, suspense, tension, drama, and complexity.
->2023 Reading Challenge.
->Glennie's Collection
Dick Francis novels were a familiar fixture in our household when I was growing up, as both my parents loved his books. He was amongst the first ‘adult’ reads that I explored at the time, and over the years I have read everything he’s written. I remember every time my mother read one of his books, she'd tell me about him and how he'd gone from being an RAF pilot to being the Queen Mother's favourite jockey, before retiring to become a journalist/writer.
Since my mother passed away over a year ago, I have been making my way through her book collection, finally. I decided to make reading her entire collection a part of my reading challenge for the next couple of years (she has a HUGE collection), as well as a way to pay tribute to my mum, who was such a voracious reader..... Reading her collection of books has stirred up a lot of memories, mostly of our shared love of reading. I am forever grateful that she passed on her love of reading to me.