Life once more challenges Sid Halley, ex-jockey and ex-investigator, to turn lemons into lemonade. You'd think that replacing his prosthetic left hand with a transplanted hand would be great for Sid, but its main consequence is the announcement by his wife, cancer researcher Marina, that she's so freaked out by the new limb that she's leaving him--or at least that she's taking their 9-year-old daughter with her to Holland to care for her dying father and has no particular plans to return. In her absence, the always-moody Sid has nothing better to do than take up arms on behalf of Gary Bremner, a Yorkshire trainer and former jockey whose horse caused the damage to Sid's hand during a race years ago. Gary is afraid that his stable will be targeted by a mysterious jockeys' agent who's not only found more and more creative ways to grab a piece of any transactions between trainers and the jockeys they hire, but who's begun to dictate which favorites must lose which races. Gary's absolutely right that defying the trainer, whom he eventually identifies as the sinister Anton Valance, is bad business. Though he miraculously escapes the barn fire that claims three of his horses, he doesn't escape getting hanged from a tree, providing a news flash to DCI Williams, who'd assumed that Gary had died in that fire. The longer Sid spends poking into the jump-racing world of trainers and jockeys and horses he's repeatedly tried to walk away from, the more convinced he becomes that Valance has a partner, and identifying that partner becomes his obsession. The inflated but routine mystery accordingly gets less and less mysterious as it goes along, but the horse-racing dope is as fascinating as ever. For fans whose pulses quicken when they hear that "the very future of British racing was at risk." Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Francis's excellent 12th horse-racing crime novel (after 2021's Iced) is a perfect homage to his father Dick's major continuing character, champion jockey-turned-PI Sid Halley. Sid's life is upended when his wife abruptly announces she's leaving him and taking their nine-year-old daughter with her. As Sid wonders whether their relationship is salvageable, Gary Bremner, a former competitor, contacts him. Bremner, who's now a trainer, claims his horses have been threatened, a fear vindicated when a fire at his stables kills several of the animals and apparently Bremner himself. Sid learns that an unknown agent has been imposing an additional fee for their services, making trainers' access to jockeys to ride in races contingent on the payment, and even directing some jockeys to deliberately lose, undermining the integrity of the turf. Despite having taken a step back from investigating, Sid plunges into the case, risking his life to save the sport he loves from a devastating scandal. Francis nicely balances his lead's personal challenges with his sleuthing. Fans of the original will hope for more of Felix Francis's Sid Halley. Agent: Ed Wilson, Johnson & Alcock (U.K.). (Nov.)

One of the most compelling figures in crime fiction is Sid Halley, a champion British jump jockey. His track career ended when a horse's hoof severed his left hand in a racecourse fall, leaving Sid to begin a new career as a private investigator specializing in racing-world crimes. Halley first appeared in Dick Francis' Odds Against in 1965, then in three more Dick Francis mysteries, and one (Refusal, 2014) by Dick Francis' son, Felix, who has been brilliantly crafting new mysteries in the Dick Francis vein since his father's death in 2010. Halley is back, as mind-bogglingly brave and resourceful as ever, with a hand transplant replacing his old prosthetic. (The transplant still leaves him vulnerable to permanent injury from any assault.) A former racing rival tips Sid off that a syndicate of jockeys' agents is taking over racing, controlling which horses run and which win or lose. As usual in Halley mysteries, the action keeps building; the atmosphere, including racetracks and a castle once inhabited by Richard III, is deftly realized; and a wealth of fascinating details is served up, including the fact that horse racing is the only sport where ambulances pursue the participants. Holding it all together is Sid Halley himself: challenged physically, personally, and professionally, yet clearing every hurdle.