This is Francis's 5th book, as far as I can tell (which is done by looking at the copyright date and subtracting from the first year he was published, so I'm reasonably close, anyway). It's still unquestionably got his knack for astonishingly adept descriptions with a handful of words, but it's more verbose than I think any of the later books I've read. This is not a complaint, just an observation: my feeling is that as he got better, he pared the books down to their essence, making them tour de forces in a way this one wasn't.

Also, reading books written and set in the late 60s/early 70s, with a visible eye for the period detail, is really pretty fun. :)

This story is a bit of a departure from Francis first several books, in that the main character suffers from medical depression, and he battles it throughout the book. The plot is very inventive, and the ending the more realistic in that it is not the fairy tale one you might expect. Reading these books in publication order, I am again struck at Francis' ability to plot and to develop character, both of which were compelling right from his early career.

c1969; FWFTB: Kentucky, kidnapped, stallions, survival, blackmail . FCN: Gene Hawkings: Not sure whether or not I am correct, but I think this was adapted into a film starring Ian Mcshane. A stand alone novel that is fairly grim to read. I love certain words so can't resist this blurb - "Thundering skullduggery... impressive turn of speed ... champion form" Sunday Telegraph To state the obvious, though, Mr Francis has such a wry sense of humour. "I sat three inches deep in black leather and considered that of all American craftsman, I admired their chair designers most: in no other country in the world could one sit on the same seat for several hours without protest from the sacro-iliac"

This really isn’t my favorite Francis novel. I find it to be disjointed and jumpy. I also have problems with the main character’s relationship. It’s weird feeling reading this book.

BLOOD SPORT - VG
Francis, Dick - 6th book

Gene Hawkings must travel to Kentucky, on the orders of his boss, to spend three weeks looking for kidnapped stallions. But before he leaves, Gene's survival skills are called on closer to home, catapulting him into a maelstrom of blackmail and murder.

I wasn't quite as taken by this book as his others. The protagonist didn't speak to me in the same way.

This gets 3.5 stars rather than four, as I wasn't comfortable with the budding relationship between Gene Hawkins, the protagonist who, by his own admission, was "a couple of years away from forty" and seventeen-year-old Lynnie Keeble. I know that the age of consent is lower in the U.K. than in the U.S.; I know that they did nothing more than kiss, and that only once; I know that other characters pointed out repeatedly that Lynnie was too young for Gene. Even Gene said that she was far too innocent to get involved with someone like him. And yet it ended with a promise of "wait until she's twenty-one," with a distinct hint that Lynnie would not change her mind about being in love with Gene. I knew that I was supposed to feel that this was a positive relationship and that Lynnie's love of life could help Gene reconnect with it...but every time they were together on the page, I thought, "You are thirty-eight. She's seventeen. You are LITERALLY old enough to be her father!"

That would not have squicked me if this were a medieval or Victorian era setting, where disproportionate ages of partners are common. But in England and America fifty years ago? I couldn't rationalize that such a pairing was typical of the setting. The relationship was secondary at best, but still I found myself wishing repeatedly that Lynnie had been a college student of twenty-two, at least, rather than a seventeen-year-old kid.

I'm sorry that I had to mark this book down for the underage relationship, because I really have to give Francis props for its portrayal of a clinically depressed man. Francis gets what suicidal depression is like--the exhaustion, the sheer effort it takes to talk to people, the numbness, the sensation of drowning while weighed down by intolerable burdens; in fact, I'd say that this is a report by someone who has been through it all and knows intimately what depression is like. And Francis doesn't hit the pause button on Gene Hawkins' depression when plot points occur; it's just one more problem that Gene has to overcome. Yet the book itself is not depressing. Kudos to you, Mr. Francis, for all of this.

Mention must be made, too, of Eunice Teller, the wife of the man who hired Gene to find the horses. Eunice is persistently described as "bored," but it's clear that she's not merely bored but suffocating in a life of wealth and luxury in which she has nothing to do. Gene is the one who recognizes that her alcoholism and her melodramatic attempts to seduce him are symptoms of depression and desperation, pointing out that using her creative talents in interior design might help her. That, in fact, she needs to use her skills. She takes his advice. Mercifully, this does not lead to an instant fix (she remains alcoholic and somewhat bitter), but it does give her a release--and a tie to life--that she didn't have before.

As for the plot--it involves finding three stolen race horses (Chrysalis, Allyx and Showman, Chrysalis being the most recent theft) and the difficulty of proving (in 1967, when this was written) that the stolen horses, who are all dark bays with no markings, are themselves and not, as the thieves claim, completely different horses. DNA tests, "chipped" horses, and n  genetic profiles of foals in uteron do not yet exist in the book's universe, and all that the blood tests of Blood Sport can do is prove if a horse has blood type X...not if it's Horse A or Horse B.

It's a knotty problem for ex-spy turned investigator Gene, who decides to steal back first one horse and then the next two on the grounds that a) this will get the horses back to their original owners and b) it might lead the thieves to betray themselves. And he's right...as far as he goes. But the thieves are quick and resourceful, and they're very good at figuring out what Gene and his allies are planning--which proves perilous on more than one occasion.

All in all, a pretty good read.

This is one of my favorite Dick Francis novels. His heroes are always very well-drawn, but I found Gene Hawkins particularly to the point, fighting with very human issues as he outwardly appears a typical Bond-style professional hero type. The actual plot isn't really the appeal of this book for me, it's the character of the hero in and of itself.

A Jackson, Wyoming dude ranch is the setting for this one. I liked it enormously! I've spent a bit of time in Jackson and in the other parts of the American desert West Francis uses for the setting of this book, and I think that was a draw. It is a particularly good sample of Francis's writing. Gene Hawkins is the hero.

Most crime / detective novels work out pretty well for me. Unfortunately this one ended up being an exception to the rule. The background story about horse breeding had no real pull for me, and the actual detective portion was quite a bit... elementary? simplistic? Honestly it was almost agitating how the clues lead in a direct path, without any real twists or turns, to the ultimate outcome. The characters were mediocre and quite forgettable. The only redeeming point is the novel was well written from a literary context standpoint. Otherwise, i dont think its worth recommending at all.

Most of the time I can enjoy a decent crime novel even if the particular subject matter does not interest me that much. This book failed to live up to my expectations.

Horse racing and horses in general do not hold any fascination to me and thus the background of this book was not that interesting. But that was not the main failing of this book. The main problem was that it was too much of a simplistic linear police procedural, where clue 'A' led to clue 'B' and so on. You never discover what the main protagonist does as a real job, but he was such a depressing person that I did not really care by the end of the book. At one point, I was really hoping he was going to kill himelf.

Not my type of book at all. Perhaps later Dick Francis books are better, but it's going to be a long time before I try another one.

A brilliant read! I’m re-reading all the Dick Francis books and this is as relevant now as it was in 1968! An original storyline involving stolen race horses and hooray! No romantic interludes! Just a fast moving story. Thoroughly enjoyable with a sad twist at the end. ( Assuming you get “involved” with the characters).

Dick Francis is always a good read--fast, interesting and exciting.

Blood Sport comes from early in his career, published in 1967, and he hadn't quite settled down into his ex-jockey, or jockey as progtagonist. Here we have government agent Gene Hawkins who works for some unnamed British government agency. We know he gets the people out of jams, carries a Luger, has a dark past which had put him in some dangerous and unsavory situations. He's dealing with depression from the woman who broke up with him over a year earlier. And his father was connected to horse racing, but that's in the distant past.

For his three weeks vacation--holiday in Britain--his boss convinces him to help someone locate a horse that has been stolen. He turns it down, until he sees an accident that was actually an attempted murder.

The case sends him to the US (a rarity in Fancis books) going from New York to Kentucky to California, Las Vegas and Arizona.

As always it's a fast-paced story. I was hooked from almost the beginning. There were a couple editing things which threw me off--his editors should have spotted these issues quickly. Mainly it has to do with language. Too often in here he has Americans using British slang too easily. One that also distracted me was near the finale, he switches back and forth between torch and flashlight on the same page. In England, it's always torch, not flashlight.

As time passed, the editors got better at their job and he developed enough clout to demand better editors.

It's definitely worth the read.