REVIEW: Break in by Dick Francis
B Reviews Category / B+ Reviews / Recommended Readshorses / thriller/suspence25 Comments
Steeplechase jockey Christmas “Kit” Fielding has had more than his share of close calls both on and off the course. But trouble hits close to home when a grudge between his family and his sister’s in-laws turns into a blood feud.
Review:
Dear readers,
I’ve always loved to reread my favorite books – in recent years, after I found the m/m genre and started reviewing it I had less time to reread, but I am getting back into it. I had been thinking about a couple of books by Dick Francis which I read in Russian translation a couple of decades ago and wanted to read them in the original. I could not find them, which I suspect was because the title was not an exact translation; instead I found this book, which I never read before.
I know that Dick Francis was a jockey before he became a writer, or was he both a jockey and a writer at some point of his life? I am not sure, I am not familiar with his biography, I am just saying that when he wrote about the world of horse racing, it was a world he seemed to know very well and it showed in his books.
Kit (because I completely share his dislike of his full name) Fielding is a jockey who often but not always wins his races. He loves racing, and he grew up in a family who has been working in this world for quite a while.
“I raced, I thought fancifully, as one might play a violin, making one’s own sort of music from coordinated muscles and intuitive spirit. I raced because the partnership with horses filled my mind with perfections of cadence and rhythmic excitement and intensities of communion: and one couldn’t exactly say aloud such pretentious rubbish. “I feel alive,” I said, “on a horse.”
The Fieldings also seem to have a feud going on forever with another horse-racing family, the Allardecs. In fact his beloved grandfather, who raised Kit and his twin sister Holly, still does not have many good things to say about them. Several years ago Holly committed the sin of marrying Bobby Allardec, and needless to say the older generations of the familes on both sides were not happy. Neither was Kit initially, but he came around very quickly, and came to their wedding and gave Holly away. Kit and Holly were always very close, and while obviously they could not communicate on the same intimate level as they did before ( I let you discover what I mean when I say “intimate level” but it is not a physical intimacy, don’t worry), they remained close friends.
One day Holly comes to Kit’s races and asks for help because somebody is trying to destroy their horse training business. Bobby was already struggling financially, and after a certain newspaper wrote about his situation in a very over the top way, somebody delivered the newspaper to all Bobby’s suppliers, creditors, horse owners. Needless to say, his problems increased dramatically. Kit loves Holly and Allardec or not, he likes her husband, so of course he agrees to help.
I really liked Kit. It was clear that he was a tough cookie when he decided to put himself in the line of fire and tried to figure out who had it in for his brother-in-law badly enough to destroy his business. I liked that he never gave up, even though he knew that he could get hurt very badly, especially considering whom he eventually went up against. I liked his intelligence and generosity, but there was something else in Kit that I liked, which I rarely see in mainstream mystery/thrillers. I don’t know how else to explain it except to say that I felt like Kit was a romantic lead in the best sense of the word. He was not without flaws, but he was just so darn likeable. He was not sitting around feeling sorry for himself and the people he was trying to protect for pages and pages, but he was not afraid to feel things, rather than just acting upon them. He acted upon things most of the time and rolled with the punches, do not get me wrong.
“It’s not like that here.” Here, I thought numbly, one bargained with threats. On the one side: I’ll get your wrist slapped by the Press Council, I’ll get questions asked in Parliament, I’ll see your ex-convict journalist back in the dock. And on the other, I’ll slice your tendons, I’ll lose you your jockey’s license for taking bribes, I’ll put you in prison. Reviled, dishonored, and with publicity, disgraced. Catch me first, I thought.”
The book was a thriller (I would be hard pressed to call it a mystery because the villains are revealed pretty early and I think even the final motivations of some of them were not intended to be a surprise), NOT a Romance, even though Kit had a secondary romantic storyline going on which had nice ending, maybe even an HFN ending. But I would say that Kit’s characterization made me think of romantic lead’s characterization, absolutely.
Even though I did not think of the book as a mystery (there was no murder, even though there was a murder attempt or two), I did not think it hurt the story in the slightest. It moved fast, I could not put it down and I was rooting for Kit to win all the way.
Grade: B+
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@Sirius,
This has a sequel-Bolt. It has been a LOOONNNGGG time since I’ve read either one, but they were both good, IIRC.
I just found Bolt but not Break In among my 12 hardcover Dick Francis books. I starting reading them about 30 years ago, A love shared with my long gone Mother -in-law. Thanks for bringing it to my attention with your great review. Whip Hand was my favorite and I must go find it.
I’m a big Dick Francis fan, but it’s best not to read too many books of his close together, as you start to see a lot of similarities. The heroes are generally the same type, and they always get tortured at some point in the story.
As an aside, my phone’s voice recognition started this entry with “I need big dick…”
I loved Dick Francis as a teenager – he was the only author that me, my mom and my brother all liked, probably for different reasons. I haven’t read him in years.
I know I read a Kit Fielding book but the summary doesn’t sound familiar. Either I’ve forgotten the details or I only read the sequel.
I think part of what I liked about Dick Francis is that his heroes were noble and heroic but they also seemed like real people, at least more so than other male suspense heroes. And they were very educational for teenage me – the sex scenes were not at all graphic but he mentioned things like orgasms very matter of factly. And infidelity. And I’m sure the first time I read about kink / bdsm was about a Dick Francis bad guy. So that’s not great, but he did have gay supporting characters who were portrayed positively, at least for the era. No idea how well that part holds up now.
Cleo I agree that from few books I have read his characters seem like real people. Gay supporting characters who were portrayed positively also sounds good to me.
Kris Bock thanks for the warning . I think this is true for most prolific writers though – even if they don’t write same story and characters over over again similarities are bound to happen IMO .
Michelle I have “Bolt” on my kindle :-).
Connie thanks I will check out “Whip hand”.
I’ve read all his books often and love them but sometimes the unreasonableness of the antagonists crosses the line into being unbelievable. They bear grudges and expect so much and I want to smack them, lol. I believe his wife Mary wrote them to a large extent; it’s sad that she couldn’t own her work.
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/news/dick-francis-thrillers-were-ghost-written-by-wife-743503.html
Though that could be an exaggerated claim; guess we’ll never know the full details.
@Jane Davitt: It seems fairly clear that the books were a joint project from the very beginning, but the more extreme claim that he was essentially a front rests on one conversation between the biographer and Mary Francis which took place almost two decades before the biography was published. I’ve read a bunch of the stories that have come out since the bio, and my sense is that she was very involved in the research and rewriting, but a lot of the topics (and the main characters) echo Dick Francis’s interests and attitudes (toward the press, the racing establishment, etc.).
This is a very interesting article by Felix Francis, who cowrote four books with his father after his mother died. The power of the new release in selling the backlist holds even for the most successful authors, I guess.
This is what Dick Francis said about their collaboration:
“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.”
Two other Dick Francis novels that I really enjoyed and re-read are Hot Money and Dead Heat – the latter was co-authored by Felix Francis, who has continued the Dick Francis novels. The books written by Felix have been hit-or-miss for me but my husband and son have enjoyed them all.
Oh, wow. This brings back memories! I used to have all of his books (not the ones by Felix, tho) either in HB or PB. I even had a couple of signed copies from long-ago book signings. I loved almost all of the books, but I haven’t read one in decades. You’ve made me nostalgic for a revisit.
Lor this is the quote I remember seeing about their collaboration too – few months ago when I decided to go look. Sunita,, Jane Davitt thanks for the links !
I enjoy Dick Francis, too, and have been reading him for years. He was indeed a champion steeplechase jockey and rode horses belonging to the Queen Mother. His autobiography Sport of Queens is worth a read. My favorites were the Syd Halley books. After reading an unauthorized bio, whose title escapes me, I believe that he and Mary collaborated very closely. His education stopped well before graduation from high school, while she attended an exclusive girls’ school. He had the technical knowledge and insight into the world of racing and horses, and she could put the words together. I think it’s telling that he had to have another collaborator when his wife died. I don’t think it was every particularly secret, but the times and culture they lived in meant the female stayed in the background. He was very famous when he started writing, and it was natural to put his name on the books to get the attention of the market.
Sirius, before you read Whip Hand, you might want to read Odds Against, which is the first of the Sid Halley books. Whip Hand is the better of the two, though, and is one of my favorites, along with For Kicks, and The Edge.
One of my favorite Dick Francis books is Reflex, where the hero is a jockey and amateur photographer. He has to solve film photography puzzles, which I found quite interesting. It also has a bit more romance than many of his books. This is one of the books that has a positive portrayal of a gay couple, though it’s not stereotype free. They act as foster parents for the hero for several years when he is a teenager, and are the ones to introduce him to photography.
GeriUpNorth – I see “Reflex” available on kindle – so I one clicked . Not all his books are yet unfortunately and positive portrayal of gay couple is always a plus for me . Thanks.
@etv13: I bought the hardcover which include first three Sid Halley books I think – can’t check because I am not at my house now and won’t be for a few days . Thanks for another recommendation for these series .
@Kilian Metcalf: I don’t know how they collaborated but I am not sure that not finishing high school or finishing high school for girls ( unless I misunderstood you and she attended college for women?) is that much difference education wise . And while I don’t know writers ( I am just personally not aware – they may exist of course ) who did not finish high school at least two of my favorite writers only did a year or two of college and never finished it. Of course based on his comment his wife was his coathor but was she the primary author ? Could be but I hope not – simply because I enjoy thinking of them as a writing duo. IMO of course .
Dick Francis is one of those authors like Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers and Georgette Heyer whose books I enjoy rereading every few years. “Break In” and its sequel “”Bolt” are two of my favourites because Kit Fielding is a great hero -smart, determined, loyal – but mostly because of how the author describes his relationship with the horses he rides. I think the race scenes are outstanding.
Unlike many of posters above I am less fond of Sid Halley as the protagonist in Dick Francis books as I find him a bit glum.
On the topic of who actually wrote the books, I believe his wife Mary had a Degree in English Literature and Dick had been a champion jumps jockey, so I suspect theirs was a true cowriting partnership where both contributed skills and knowledge to together produce the “Dick Francis” books.
@GeriUpNorth: That was one of my favorites, and the one I was thinking of when I said there were positive (for the time) portrayals of gay people. I haven’t read it in years – I’m curious how well it holds up.
@Sirius: you’ll have to let us know what you think of Reflex (and the other Dick Francis books you read.)
Cleo I will let you know – I hope to get to Reflex sooner rather than later.
Keep wanting to mention that thanks to Sunita’s amazing searching skills I now know that the Russian movie which first introduced me to Dick Francis’ works was based on the novel “Dead cert”.
Frances I agree that Kit Fielding is a great hero, I think he will remain one of my favorite characters even if I will eventually read few more books by Dick Francis.
I bought Sid Hallley stories because couple of people recommended it but also because I am pretty sure other book I read in Russian featured him – will be interesting to see how it will hold up for me.
Typo in title of book. The first and last words of a book title are always capped. Should be Break In.
Check out Amazon, B&N and Goodreads that got it right.
Thanks Eliza . I will correct it eventually.
I just wanted to let you guys know that I finished “Reflex”. I still love Kit more but I thought Philip was maybe even more interesting character – more flawed yes but also the one who grows and changes more as the book progresses .
Positive portrayal of gay couples – sure , besides his foster parents ( unofficial ones but still parents ) there is even another one very briefly mentioned . Boy so true about stereotypes though – obviously they need to not be happy and of course we need some suicide to make the tragedy complete but at least it was still a positive portrayal for the times I guess .