Felix Francis new book, Syndicate

Reminds me a little of Clement Freud and the syndicate or club he was in that owned Motivator.  Clement was very upset that he didn't get a fair share of the spoils or whatever.

Read the book over two days while the builders (or are we supposed to call them tradies now?) replaced the front door, replaced the fusebox, and generally made a mess. And all for £3,000. Bargain.

The basic plot, the whodunnit element, came to me quite early when it popped into my brain that I'd seen it used in a decades old television programme. You'd probably get more from the book without this, so I shan't give it away here.

There is some good background stuff on choosing yearlings and races, but at times (as is often the case with this author) it feels like a research dump, where every single fact the author learned while researching the book is crammed into the story.

And you have to struggle through an explanation of every type of betting from bookmakers, the Tote and exchanges in order to get to matched betting (which is basically what we used to call arbs. and which you often see sharks touting to lure in the naive) which is vaguely relevant to the plot.

I’m half way through the fourth Thursday Murder Club book by Richard Osman. They are an absolute hoot and very easy reading. Would recommend to anyone who doesn’t want anything too serious to read.

CagliariG -- poor author basically plagiarising his fathers style without the ability to weave a tale as his old man could.

Or was it his mother's style?

The one thing Felix has got over his dad's later works is they are actually set in the racing world, not just Fred Smith owns a racehorse followed by 300 pages that never mention racing again.