Different from other Dick Francis books - slower, deeper, more thoughtful. Wonderful characters, as always, but we get to know them more—better and more deeply—than usual. And, consequently, are more deeply affected by what happens to them. I’ve read and enjoyed many Dick Francis books but this is the very best. Highly recommend.

Tim Ekaterin is a banker who finances the purchase of Sandcastle, a champion stud racehorse. Sandcastle’s new owner, Oliver Knowles, makes a fortune breeding the stallion. When Sandcastle’s offspring are born, they are discovered to have severe abnormalities. This dramatically decreases the value of Oliver’s investment, and puts him in danger of losing everything. Things go from bad to worse when Ginnie, Oliver’s daughter is found dead under suspicious circumstances. Dick Francis adds mystery when he includes multiple murders, and develops shady dispositions for other characters. Francis even works in a romance and ends with a cliff hanger. “Banker” is only the second book I have read by this author and I was pleased to note that the story revolved around a different character. I’m not much for series, although Francis does follow the same theme in his books – racehorses.
I learned a lot about veterinary medicine and treatments with this book.

Darker and sadder than the usual Dick Francis, so there’s some merit, but in general, tiresome.

Not my favorite Dick Francis book. I love his work in part because every book
is different (except for the horse connection obviously). But I really prefer the
"murder in the first few pages and solve it for the rest of the book" format over
anticipating the murder for over a hundred pages. There are also a very few
of his books that include some gruesome horse details and this is one of them.

Another Dick Francis, another profession (or two) learned about - this time, investment banking (those people are a unique breed!), and the horse stud industry. I liked have a main character who wasn't a jockey for a change. A good flatline, and plenty of thought provoking descriptions regarding valor in love, and relationships between teenagers and parents.

3.5 Stars

"A classic mystery from Dick Francis, the champion of English storytellers. Tim Ekaterin has a lot of money. Unfortunately, it is other people's, and it is his job to invest it wisely, or get fired. And right now he's taken a big risk: using £5 million to stud a champion racing stallion. When the resulting foals have birth defects, Tim is worried and decides that there may be something else going on at the stables. His suspicions are confirmed when one of those helping with the horses is murdered. Now it's not just about money, but about life and death. Determined to get to the bottom of why anyone would do this, Tim puts himself in danger's path to discover the truth . . ."
Banker by Dick Francis is an intriguing crime & investigation mystery with horses, banking, workplace politics, tension, drama, mystery, suspense, tension, intrigue, and more.
->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.

This is among the better novels written by Dick Francis. The protagonist, Tim Ekaterin, is an investment banker at a large and venerable firm. The firm is approached by Oliver Knowles who owns a stud farm. Knowles wants to borrow $5 million to buy a racehorse named Sandcastle and put him out to stud. The horse has run brilliantly and, on form, would probably do equally well at stud. This is not the sort of a loan that a staid, conservative bank would normally even consider, but several of the bank's directors, including Tim and his boss, have seen the horse run and are intrigued by the proposition.

Tim is assigned to investigate Knowles, his operation, and his finances and make a recommendation to the board. Tim develops an immediate affinity for Knowles, is impressed with his operation, and recommends that the bank make the loan with all sorts of precautions being taken. The bank agrees with Tim and makes the loan over the strong objections of one director who insists that this will be a very costly mistake. Tim is assigned as the case manager and is to stay in touch with Knowles and monitor the situation.

Since this is a Dick Francis novel, something will go horribly wrong, of course. (A word to the wise, don't read the teaser on the book cover which gives way too much away in this regard.) Tim will have to try to sort it out in an effort to save both Knowles and the bank's investment. Naturally, there will be some very sinister people involved and things will ultimately get very dicey for virtually everyone, but mostly for Tim Ekaterin.

This novel is a bit unique in that it takes place over a period of three years. Ekaterin is a fairly typical Francis protagonist who has fallen in love with the wrong woman, but it's very interesting to watch him work. He is forced to learn a great deal about how champion horses are bought, sold and protected, and about the business of putting a champion like Sandcastle out to stud. He also has to learn a great deal about pharmaceuticals, and as he learns all of this, the reader learns it all too.

Some of it is really fascinating but, as in the book before this one, Reflex, Francis lays it on a bit too thick. Again, having done all of the research for the book, he apparently didn't want to leave any of it in his file drawer. As a result, this is a fairly long novel that could have been trimmed a bit and still have been every bit as entertaining and informative. But that's a small complaint in this case, and this book should appeal to anyone who enjoys the novels of this former jockey.

Another page-turner from Dick Francis. The subject is a investment banker who approves a 5 million pound loan for a champion race horse to be syndicated for breeding purposes. When the offspring of the champion become born with birth defects, the banker must figure out why or the loan will turn out to be a terrible investment for the bank. His career is riding on the outcome and his life is nearly forfeit in the quest for the truth.

Banker / Dick Francis ****

Tim Ekaterin works in a merchant bank in London. A merchant bank is not a regular bank as we think of it but a financial institution which loans large sums of money to fledgling and established businesses. The story gives the reader a peek into the financial world, a “feel” for high finance and how loan decisions are made . The story is also centered around horse racing and the breeding of prime quarter horses destined to become grand champions . Of course, it is a murder mystery as well. I expect to be reading other stories by this author.

I have read several Dick Francis novels over the years. As I recall the protagonist is usually a jockey or retired jockey. Banker is a slight departure from the norm. Tim Ekaterin is an investment banker. When the story opens there is no hint of horse racing. No jockey. No race horse. No race track. Not even a murder. The entire story is rather slow at the beginning and I was wondering where it was headed. Eventually the pace picks up and there is plenty of murder and mayhem.

After Ekaterin and some colleagues attend a horse race they learn that one of the horses, Sandcastle, is up for sale and he arranges raising millions for the purchase of Sandcastle for breeding ... not racing. At first it appears to be a wise investment but then a large number of Sandcastle's foals are born with birth defects. The breeder that Tim arranged the loan for, Oliver Knowles, is in danger of going bankrupt. Tim has gotten to know Oliver and his daughter, Ginnie, and begins investigating. Things really pick up when Ginnie is found dead.

If you thought the world of finance was full of corruption and greed it doesn't come close to horse racing. There are those who have no morals, no compassion and care nothing about others or the horses. All they care about is making a fortune and they have no compunction about how they do it.

This story starts out slowly but once you get to know all of the characters it gets interesting. There are some distractions such as Tim's feelings for the wife of his boss. I am not sure what this had to with the story. Other than this it was an enjoyable read. It is not the best Dick Francis novel but it is not bad.

1 Jan 1995
1 Jan 1998
12 Mar 1998

Background: I picked up my first Dick-and-Mary Francis* in the early-80s. Read all the backlist at least once, but the early ones weren't so much my cuppa. They were a little too self-consciously hard boiled, but it always felt awkward. The last twenty or thirty were much more about the psychology of the bad guy; they weren't so much about motive, means, and opportunity as they were about why this person might commit this kind of murder, but other people, with just as much anger, or fear, or whatever, wouldn't. That's very appealing.



There are plenty of other reasons why I love the Dick Francis books. There's the horse racing setting where despite the bad events of the story, people find real joy in riding, or training, or owning, a winner; there's almost always a sweet older owner with twinkling eyes and good grace when their horse loses. There's a time when the hero endures some really horrible physical pain and is able to do it, not because of willpower or focus or anything like that: it's just that the guy heals quickly and doesn't seem to suffer nearly as much pain as others with the same injuries would do. It makes sense that any who does anything really painful on a regular basis would have to be less susceptible to pain or they'd never repeat it (I believe somewhere there's speculation that a professional jump jockey has one fall for every four races). There's always a woman, but most of the time she's unavailable, often married and not interested in leaving her husband, even after divorce became commonplace. I refuse to speculate why this pops up so often. Maybe the Francises (Franci?) just don't like their endings to be too happy. There is justice in the end and it pretty much never involves jail, but often requires some very clever blackmail-for-good. And finally, there's the other thing: in addition to racing something else is introduced, and it is something richly satisfying: photography, or creating toys, or competitive target shooting, even merchant banking which I would have thought was deadly dull.



So it's been nearly twenty years since I last read most of them, but as I read through my collection I'm loving them just as much as ever before. Two thousand sixteen: the year of rereading old mysteries.



Anyway, I'm not going to bother to write reviews of each of them. There's already a little synopsis available, and my opinion would just be gush, gush, gush, over and over again.



*"Mary and I worked as a team. ... I have often said that I would have been happy to have both our names on the cover. Mary's family always called me Richard due to having another Dick in the family. I am Richard, Mary was Mary, and Dick Francis was the two of us together" from Swanson, Jean; Dean James (2003). "An Interview with Dick Francis". The Dick Francis Companion. New York: Berkeley Prime Crime. pp. 1–10. ISBN 0-425-18187-1.


PS 11 September, 2016


I forgot to mention something that amused me. Our protagonist is explaining the set-up of the merchant bank, telling us what the departments are, and who works there and cetera. He mentions that there aren't any women on the board or in the best jobs, although there are plenty working as secretaries. He offers up a couple of possible theories as to why this might be, but he doesn't ask any of the women working there, nor does it occur to him that the simple answer "sexism" is the most likely. Everyone seems to be white, but the lack of minorities isn't even noticed. It's funny, the things we just don't see. On first reading this thirtysome years ago, I didn't notice the racism, nor did I consider the sexism.

Dick Francis finds yet another angle of the horse racing business to fascinate his readers with—this time the stud industry. To give this novel an even more unique feel, he tells the story through the eyes of a merchant banker and brings all the tribulations of high stakes investment into the novel. It’s a fascinating and exciting tale made more touching through some of Francis’ best character development. Like so many of his heroes, Banker’s protagonist falls in love with the wrong woman—not a bad woman, just someone who is not free to love him back. It adds a very touching subplot to a great mystery.