Re-read. A favourite.

Tim Ekaterin, grandson of the founder of Ekaterin's Bank and nephew to the chairman of the board, works in the banking devision making loans within limits to individuals and small businessmen. One loan is to a stud farm owner to buy a prized stallion for his farm. By the end of the book Tim has suffered much physical pain and grief but has solved a few puzzling dilemmas.

I read this book when it was first published in 1982 and 40 years on it still kept me enthralled all the way through

A first for - a Francis book that I cannot be bothered to finish. It has taken 2/3s of the book to get to the point where the protagonist starts investigating. The reader, however, has know. Who the bad guys are since very early on. There’s the usual unavailable woman to be hopelessly in love with, but there’s also a weird and inappropriate connection to a teenager. Banking is deadly dull and it’s totally not credible as to why the banker protagonist is called to figure things out all the time for the horse people. Anyhow.

I'm re-reading my shelf of Dick Francis books and once again, this is one of my favorites. It's dated but still fresh, the pacing lulls you into a false sense of security, and then the action comes fast and believable. I'm not a murder/mystery fan by any stretch of the imagination but Dick Francis always delivers.

Still great!!!

Be prepared

Major and minor characters die in this book. Two wives are widowed and a divorced father berraved of his only child. Francis does not write like George R. R. Martin, whose characters croak with maximum gore and minimum emotion. Characters you have come to like or even love are murdered or commit suicide.

The plot is standard Francis, if such a thing could be said to exist: complex, but believably solveable, powered ultimately by greed. The romantic subplot present in all his books is here very poignant, and the obstacle between the hero and his love is not removed until the very last minute. Have a box of tissues ready.

Being Dick Francis' book, there is nothing here to make you ashamed of being made to feel those feelings: for a work of fiction they are real, they are honestly felt, they are true, and they are honorably dealt with. Again, standard classic Francis.

I grieved when Mr. Francis passed, because his death meant that there would be no more books of the caliber of "Banker." I suspect that the lowered price of this book reflects his masterful handling of the deaths within it. This isn't a thriller, where everyone but the POV character dies, and you never feel a thing. So be warned: it's a great book, a profound book, but not an easy or undemanding book.

What is there to say about Dick Francis? As I think about all of his books (yes, this review covers all of his books, and yes I've read them all) I think about a moral ethical hero, steeped in intelligence and goodness embroiled in evil machinations within British horse racing society - either directly or indirectly. The heroes aren't always horse jockies, they can be film producers, or involve heroes engaged in peripheral professions that somehow always touch the horse racing world.

But more than that, Francis's heroes are rational human beings. The choices made are rational choices directed by a firm objective philosophy that belies all of Francis's novels. The dialogue is clear and touched with humor no matter the intensity of evil that the hero faces. The hero's thoughts reveal a vulnerability that is touching, while his actions are always based on doing the right thing to achieve justice.

Causing the reader to deeply care about the characters in a novel is a difficult thing to do. No such worries in a Francis novel. The point of view is first person, you are the main character as you read the story (usually the character of Mr. Douglas). The hero is personable, like able, non-violent but delivering swift justice with his mind rather than through physical means. This is not to say that violence is a stranger to our hero. Some of it staggering and often delivered by what we would think of normal persons living in British society.

You will come to love the world of Steeple Chase racing, you will grow a fondness for horses, stables, trainers and the people who live in that world. You will read the books, devouring one after the other and trust me Dick Francis has a lot of novels (over 40 by my last count).

There are several series woven into the fabric of Francis's work: notably the Sid Halley and Kit Fielding series.

Assessment: Dick Francis is one of my favorite writers. I read his books with a fierce hunger that remains insatiable and I mourn his death.

Dick Francis explored different facets of the horse racing industry in his thrillers.

This time,he looks at the working of stud farms through the eyes of a merchant banker.A champion horse Sandcastle,is put to stud and a client asks Tim Ekaterine's bank for a loan of £5 million to buy him.

But despite the hefty price tag,and the impeccable pedigree of the horse,the foals being born are deformed.

Tim Ekaterine has to look into the matter,to save his bank's massive investment.The action is spread over a period of three years.It is also a very good look at the world of merchant banking.

Frances and his wife Mary would write one book a year,and in each one,a new profession and its intricacies would be presented.

A cracking good read,one of his best.

I love this book! Good story, good writing, and comfortable.

I always enjoy a Dick Francis novel. It is well written, usually a stand-alone, and the hero is someone I think I would like to know in real life. Banker is no different. The reader learns along with Tim, the banker hero, more about race horses standing at stud and the whole business of breeding new potential racers. Of course, something goes dreadfully wrong and it is up to the hero to get it all sorted out.

If you enjoy straightforward mysteries, this is a good one.

A banker as a hero is such a contradiction it seems bizarre. This is one of Francis’s better stories. The plot is diabolical and the villain truly an evil person. Tim is a banker who makes investment decisions on who to back. After seeing Sandcastle a horse win spectacularly he convinces his colleagues to back Oliver in buying the stallion for stud. Who knew 40 was the magic number for the mares to be put in foal.

SPOILERS AHEAD

The villain of the piece is a herbalist who miraculously cures horses with herbs and the laying of hands. Obviously unlikely. What he does is via a vet he infects the horses then cures them with drugs of stopping them taking the drugs that caused the illness. The diabolical Calder then decides to cause deformation of the foals by giving mares poison that deforms the foal so he can get Sandcastle cheaply and claim to have cured him.

Calder murders his friendly vet and the daughter of the stud owner who overheard what he was doing with his accomplice. Tim discovers this and survives a mad horse when locked in a stable. Reveals to the police what Calder has done who then takes the easy way out. The love affair or longed for love affair is a bit farfetched.