An entertaining and fast paced cozy mystery.

Philip Nore, our rather vanilla protagonist, stumbles upon a recently deceased, possibly murdered, photographer's box of cryptic photos. As Nore unravels the secrets contained in the box, his own family's sad secrets come to light.

I liked it, I did not love it. There was a lot of detailed descriptions about a Jockey's life and a photographer's tasks, neither of which I'm particularly interested in. I skipped whole paragraphs of Nore in his dark room. Both the romance plot and the lost sister plot seemed to have been tacked on as an afterthought, neither of which were developed properly.

I quite enjoyed the main murder mystery, a perfect brainless summer read.

What I like best about Francis' early work is that quite aside from the mystery angle, they are stories. Good stories, well told, well plotted, with decent use of the language. They don't depend too heavily on someone explaining the whole deal; while we follow the main character's thought processes, we also follow him as he goes through the labyrinth that reveals the plot. We are shown, not told. Hallelujah. Also, the characters both good and bad are people--with foibles, weaknesses and strong points. Even some of the killers aren't "bad to the bone", though on Planet Francis (at least so far in my rereading) they must of course be mentally deranged to even consider killing. Quite a lot of the MC's elucubrations are on the nature of true justice, and if it is actually served by destroying the lives of innocent bystanders in an attempt to reveal the facts.

Phillip Nore is naturally a jump jockey, and we are treated to a visit to the world of racing, which is the reason a large chunk of his fanbase bought and devoured his books from the very beginning. The best people in the right clothes doing the right thing--mostly. (Oh those green socks the arriviste wears! He can't help getting it ever-so-slightly wrong, because it's not in his breeding. Blood will out.) The too-large jockey who starves himself on cheese and tomatoes and black tea, which must be to save calories so he can drink Coke and champagne (not together, I might add) with his trainer or his friends. Nore is also an amateur photographer (as was Mrs Francis) whose hobby leads to some very unexpected developments. I have to say I spotted the killer about time said person made an appearance, and was furlongs ahead of the jockey throughout, but it's to the author's credit that the fact took nothing away from the reading experience. I realised halfway through that I had read this book sometime in the 1980s, but remembered nothing about it except the scene where Nore sits down in a basket chair and is recognised by an old acquaintance. He's also a commitment-phobic who sees himself as a drifter who just goes with the flow--but he can't resist a good puzzle, and he can't restrain himself from righting wrongs, even if it puts him on a par with the man he despises.

Reading with hindsight, I realised that the ten quid Nore offers for some information would be tantamount to 50 pounds in today's money--quite a lot for a ten-year-old child, and even for some of us adults. It was strange to read that he classes cocaine with marijuana in his own mind as "not deadly" compared to heroin. This was, of course, before we learned better, when cocaine was the party drug of choice among those who had too much money. I wondered also if I had been handed a US-release (or perhaps a re-release) copy, as at one point Philip mentions "fuck-ups" quite in passing. I doubt very much that either of the Francises would have considered using that word (no matter which of the couple you think actually wrote the mysteries) even in 1980. "Cock-ups" quite possibly, but the F-word would definitely have been infra dig.

All in all, still a cracking good read that stood the test of time. That England is gone, if it ever existed, but hey-that's why we read fiction.

Tight writing and a not too predictable plot make this a hugely enjoyable read.

I've been reading some of my old man's favorites lately. He celebrates Dick Francis' entire catalog. Now that I've read Reflex, I can understand Dad's obsession and in turn, something about my father.

The book was surprising. A mystery novel, but not a detective or private eye story, which was welcomed. I understand that DF loves his main characters to be "common men" with good morals, and I am fine with that. Good character development right up until the end. Love the incorporation of the photograph puzzles. I have new found respect for horse racing and jockeys. They are tough, underrated athletes. I need to see a steeplechase race in person before I die, hopefully with my father by my side.

First off, much credit to my mom, she's been trying to get me to read Francis forever. No, seriously, for about 20 years. We are both ridiculously stubborn and, of course, she was right the whole time. Well played, mother.
As with all of his books, Reflex revolves around the British horseracing scene, but, luckily for me, you neither have to know nor care about any of that to be absorbed. There are three plotlines here, one about our main characters fading career as a jockey, one about his mysterious past and family, and one about photographic blackmail. All three are handled quite well, and are tangled in a way that is both believable and satisfying, but the characters are the high point here.
Our jockey, Philip Nore, is about thirty, and nearing the end of a solid career. His childhood was a mess, being shipped around from home to home by his feckless mother, but it led to him being both a professional jockey and a skilled photographer. Silver linings, yeah? Well, this leads to his being hired by the grandmother he never knew to find his heretofore unheard-of half-sister. But that is mere incident. What it really leads to is making friends with her solicitor and finding a future in the ashes of his past.
The real driver of the book is the blackmail, and the surprise joy was in the photographic aspect. Now, I know only a little more about photography than I do about horses, but the puzzle aspect was addicting as all get-out. I loved it.
Between the puzzles, the friendships, and the underlying mysteries, this is a great read For some reason, photography makes for good mystery novels, like this, La Brava by Elmore Leonard, and Double Image by David Morrell. Anyway, if you like mystery novels, give this a shot. I, personally, will definitely be reading more Francis in the future.

Philip Nore, who earns his living as a jockey, but incidentally with his camera many photos of racing places in places where the normal public has no access fights on different fronts. On the one hand he is harassed by a lawyer, that he should visit his dying grandmother and should fulfill her last wish. He gets to know his past, which was not always pleasant to him. On the other hand, he receives from a jockey colleague a box that his dead father has filled with various photo puzzles. Thanks to his experience as a photographer, he gets to the bottom of the various mysteries. Not only he, but also important persons are in danger.
In addition to all this, he is being pressured by a horse owner to manipulate races.
It was a very exciting read and kept me guessing until the end.
(4½)

Another mystery right up to the last page.

I can honestly state I had no idea what this book would end with. In fact thus far I think is the most tantalising of those I’ve read. How so many American author’s books turn up later as films yet Dick Francis’s don’t says something about our tv and film producers ! There’s still time.

Loved it. The technical photography info was fascinating. For the times, Francis's writing on homosexuality was humane and civilized. The treatment of a muted emotional life as a result of childhood damage was beautifully done. Overall, one gets an impression of Francis as an enormously warm, thoughtful, compassionate human being. (No, I don't think the wife wrote the books. I do think she wrote the really awful posthumous short stories, though. Timeline, peoples! Logic!)

Dick Francis was a… Hell, does anyone not know Dick Francis at this point? Anyway, he was a former jockey who went on to write an endless tyrade of mystery novels set in the world of horseracing. I think there’s something endearing about that.

My grandmother swore by his books and passed her addiction down to my mother, who this year finally jostled me into reading him too. And I get the hype. This was a lot of fun.It’s a nice, cosy mystery novel with several interweaving plotlines that has you turning pages so quickly you’d think you’d lost a banknote in the book.

This one in particular is about a jockey cum photography aficionado untangling a web of corruption in the racing world thanks to a secret stash of photos left behind by a recently deceased sports photographer.

For those of you who like dipping into a variety of genres, it’s well worth giving these books a try. And if you like mystery novels, what’s wrong with you, why haven’t you read them already?

Found a Dick Francis I hadn’t read in the cruise ship library. What a treat. Jockey/photographer discovers his life - past and future.

After reading Enquiry directly before this I can say I was most intrigued by the photography aspect of the novel. I enjoyed learning passively while reading this jockey mystery the intricacies of film photography especially as it relates to creating a bit of a crime scene. While my film photography is usually quite light hearted in nature I now feel as though if I need to commit a crime via film I have that under my wing. As for the story itself, I didn’t find any character or plot line particularly intriguing but thought it had a sweet ending.

His best I've read so far. A jockey who's moving towards a career as a photographer is embroiled in a dead photographer's machinations while alive and the hunt for a sister he didn't know he has.