Forfeit

Dick Francis

ISBN 10: 0330025325 / ISBN 13: 9780330025324

Edité par Pan Books, 1975

A propos de cet article

There are some titles that do half the work before you?ve even opened the book, and Forfeit is one of them. It is short, sharp, and carries the unmistakable whiff of penalty, loss, and rules being broken in expensive surroundings. Which makes it, of course, an ideal Dick Francis title. Published in 1975 by Pan Books , this is another elegant excursion into Francis?s favourite territory: the racing world, where money, prestige, danger and very bad behaviour coexist beneath a polished surface of manners, breeding and respectable tailoring. Francis had a genius for taking the world of horse racing ? a milieu dense with status, money, expertise, nerves and old loyalties ? and revealing it as the perfect ecosystem for suspense. You need not know the first thing about racing to feel the pressure in his books. He makes the whole world legible at once: the owners, the trainers, the gamblers, the hangers-on, the ambition, the fragility of reputation, and the constant possibility that somebody somewhere has decided to cheat, threaten, steal or injure in the pursuit of advantage. In Francis, the stables may be tidy, but human motives rarely are. The title Forfeit is especially pleasing because it suggests consequence. Not just danger, but the idea that something valuable may have to be surrendered: money, status, trust, safety, perhaps all four before chapter twelve. Francis was very good at that sense of encroaching cost. His novels are not merely about crime occurring; they are about decent, competent people being forced to reckon with what they stand to lose once corruption and violence press in on ordinary life. The race is never only on the track. There is always another contest underneath, usually nastier and much less regulated. What keeps Francis so readable, decade after decade, is his extraordinary control. He writes with the calm efficiency of a man who understands exactly how suspense works and sees no need to waste a sentence proving it. His heroes are often intelligent, practical men who would greatly prefer not to be dragged into a nest of blackmail, extortion, sabotage or worse, but who possess the deeply inconvenient habit of persisting once they sense that something is wrong. That combination ? professional competence plus moral stubbornness ? is one of the great engines of the Francis novel. And the settings matter. Francis understood that the racing world is not just picturesque backdrop. It is integral to the tension. Horses are valuable, people are invested, reputations are brittle, and the money can be enormous. Add to this the veneer of civility that clings to much of British sporting life and you have the ideal thriller environment: polished enough to be interesting, ruthless enough to be dangerous. There is always something delicious about the way Francis lets violence and fear seep into these outwardly ordered spaces. The more respectable the setting, the more satisfying the disruption. There is also something gloriously British in the understatement of it all. A title like Forfeit sounds almost legalistic, almost restrained, as though one might simply lose a point or concede a minor procedural advantage. In a Francis novel, however, such tidy language generally masks a much messier reality. This is part of the pleasure. The books understand that British life often prefers to discuss catastrophe in tones suitable for a cancelled garden party. One does not panic. One merely notes that matters have become awkward . This Good copy has the honest, reassuring appeal of a proper thriller paperback that has likely already lived a useful life: read on trains, by bedside lamps, or during holidays where the intention was ?something light? and the result was several hours of extremely efficient tension. A good Francis paperback ought to look as though it has been enjoyed. It was not made to languish untouched in decorative stillness. It was made to be read briskly by someone who appreciates a civilised setting descending.

N° de réf. du vendeur 6054

Détails bibliographiques

• Titre: Forfeit
• Éditeur: Pan Books
• Date de parution: 1975
• Langue: anglais
• ISBN à 10 chiffres: 0330025325
• ISBN à 13 chiffres: 9780330025324
• Reliure: Paperback
• État de l'article: Good

A propos de ce titre

Synopsis

Bert Checkov was a Fleet Street racing correspondent with an unnerving talent for tipping non-starters for big races. But the advice he gave James Tyrone, a few minutes before he fell to his death, was of a completely different nature...Not one for the quiet life, Tyrone has a bloodhound's nose for trouble and pretty soon he's caught up in an increasingly dangerous game. One that threatens him, his crippled wife and the credibility of the racing world. Blowing the roof off is the number one policy of The Sunday Blaze ...and Tyrone hyas stumbled upon explosive material. 'A superb chiller and killer' New York Times Book Review

Présentation de l'éditeur

A classic mystery from Dick Francis, the champion of English storytellers. Bert Checkov, a racing correspondent, drunkenly confesses to fellow Fleet Street hack James Tyrone that he's been giving his readers bum tips for years. Five minutes later, Checkov's fallen out a seventh floor window. Tyrone has a nose for a story and he's convinced there's more to his friend's death than meets the eye. When he starts digging, he discovers that many of Checkov's tips never even made it to the start. But the deeper Tyrone gets, the dirtier and more dangerous this business appears to be. If he's not careful he'll be following Checkov to his death... Praise for Dick Francis: 'As a jockey, Dick Francis was unbeatable when he got into his stride. The same is true of his crime writing' Daily Mirror 'Dick Francis's fiction has a secret ingredient - his inimitable knack of grabbing the reader's attention on page one and holding it tight until the very end' Sunday Telegraph 'The narrative is brisk and gripping and the background researched with care . . . the entire story is a pleasure to relish' Scotsman 'Francis writing at his best' Evening Standard 'A regular winner . . . as smooth, swift and lean as ever' Sunday Express 'A super chiller and killer' New York Times Book Review Dick Francis was one of the most successful post-war National Hunt jockeys. The winner of over 350 races, he was champion jockey in 1953/1954 and rode for HM Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, most famously on Devon Loch in the 1956 Grand National. On his retirement from the saddle, he published his autobiography, The Sport of Queens, before going on to write forty-three bestselling novels, a volume of short stories (Field of 13), and the biography of Lester Piggott. During his lifetime Dick Francis received many awards, amongst them the prestigious Crime Writers' Association's Cartier Diamond Dagger for his outstanding contribution to the genre, and three 'best novel' Edgar Allan Poe awards from The Mystery Writers of America. In 1996 he was named by them as Grand Master for a lifetime's achievement. In 1998 he was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, and was awarded a CBE in the Queen's Birthday Honours List of 2000. Dick Francis died in February 2010, at the age of eighty-nine, but he remains one of the greatest thriller writers of all time.