Dead Heat

‘I wondered if I was dying. I wasn’t afraid to die but, such was the pain in my gut, I wished it would happen soon.’

The night before the Two Thousand Guineas at Newmarket sees the great and the good of the horse-racing community gathered for a prestigious black-tie Gala dinner. It is a fitting testament to the glamour of the occasion that Max Moreton is cooking the evening’s meal.

Max is something of a celebrity in Newmarket circles. He is the chef and founder of the racing town’s favourite Michelin-starred restaurant, the Hay Net. However, spending the night in the throes of agony with chronic food poisoning is the last thing Max expects – such things simply aren’t becoming of a professional chef. And the last thing he needs is to hear that his food is suspected of putting twenty-four of the guests in hospital.

Within hours, Max’s restaurant is being forcibly closed, his reputation is teetering on the brink of ruin, and a court case seems to be looming. But the day is far from over, and soon Max Moreton finds himself desperately fighting for more than just his livelihood...

Dick Francis (Author)
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.

Felix Francis (Author)
Felix Francis studied Physics and Electronics at London University and then embarked upon a seventeen-year career teaching Advanced Level Physics.

Felix Francis is the younger son of crime writer and National Hunt jockey Dick Francis, and over the past forty years Felix assisted Dick with both the research and the writing of many of his novels. Felix's love of racing, writing talent, and knowledge and experience as a physics teacher was invaluable in the father-and-son writing partnership.

Felix has written ten 'Francis' novels, the first, Under Orders, published in 2006. Then followed Dead Heat, Silks, Even Money, Crossfire, Gamble, Bloodline, Refusal, Damage and Felix's tenth novel, Front Runner.