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will love Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. Excellent book, nice twists to the plot (especially the escape of the hero from his captor towards the end) (  ) jsfrodo | Jun 9, 2009 |  Featuring Sid Halley, the one-handed ex-jockey turned investigator (previous outings in Whip Hand, Odds Against, etc.), this was a slightly more loggy Francis than I remembered. A race-fixing scheme and a couple of murders, along with an attack on Halley's new girlfriend liven things up, but lengthy segments on internet gambling weren't all that fun to sweat through. (Yes, this was elliptical fodder, as well-lol!) I almost had the feeling that a few of the passages had been used previously.... I will, of course, have to read back through a few others to find out if it's only writing style that jogged my memory, or if there is a bit of self-cribbing going on. (  ) fssunnysd | Apr 17, 2009 | A ripping yarn that races along. I read it at a single sitting over three mugs of coffee so it is not hugely demanding. I enjoyed the experience although I felt that this return of ex-jockey Halley as a hero also involved undesirably familiar plot elements from the previous Halley tales. (  ) TheoClarke | Apr 5, 2009 | A third tale about jockey-turned-private-eye Sid Halley, "Under Orders" resolves Sid's feelings about his ex-wife, gives him a new one, and confirms the proposition that you can only defeat bullies by standing up to them, despite the horrific costs of doing so. The mystery itself was only so-so (the culprits were clear early on, although the exact mechanisms required work). ( ) booklog | Mar 31, 2009 | After loosing his left hand in an accident as a jockey, Sid Halley used his track connections to become a private detective. In the fourth Halley mystery, the series that started with Odds Against, he is confronted with three deaths in one afternoon. The plot continues to twist as Halley tries to solve the four murders while determining if someone is fixing horse races. Amid all the chaos, Halley's personal life becomes entangled in danger. Although some of the characters' motives are dark and violence exists around many corners, the story itself is not depressing thanks to Francis' dry wit. As a former steeplejockey, an Edgar Award winner, and the 1996 Mystery Writers of America's Grand Master, Frances knows both the worlds of horse racing and mystery writing. He is the master of combining horse racing with suspenseful mysteries to create a tale that will appeal to fans of both.  npl | Nov 28, 2008 |  no reviews | add a review
Amazon.com Product Description (ISBN 0399154000, Hardcover)"Sadly, death at the races is not uncommon. However, three in a single afternoon was sufficiently unusual to raise more than one eyebrow." It's the third death on Cheltenham Gold Cup Day that really troubles super-sleuth Sid Halley. Last seen in 1995's Come to Grief, former champion jockey Halley knows the perils of racing all too well-but in his day, jockeys didn't usually reach the finishing line with three .38 rounds in the chest. But this is precisely how he finds jockey Huw Walker-who, only a few hours earlier, had won the coveted Triumph Hurdle. Just moments before the gruesome discovery, Halley had been called upon by Lord Enstone to make discreet inquiries into why his horses appeared to be on a permanent losing streak. Are races being fixed? Are bookies taking a cut? And if so, are trainers and jockeys playing a dangerous game with stakes far higher than they are realistic? Halley's quest for answers draws him even deeper into the darker side of the race game, in a life-or-death power play that will push him to his very limits-both professionally and personally.(retrieved from Amazon Fri, 24 Apr 2009 07:57:55 -0400) The first test round has been closed. Visit the Open Shelves Classification group for details. |
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