Dick Francis wrote more than 40 international best-sellers. His first book was his autobiography The Sport of Queens, for which he was offered the aid of a ghostwriter, which he spurned. He set his first thriller, Dead Cert, published in 1962, in the world of horse racing, establishing a specialized niche for his work. His novel Whip Hand is one of only two novels to have received both the Gold Dagger Award for Best Novel of 1979 and the Edgar Award for Best Novel of 1980. Francis has published only eight short stories in his 41 years as a bestselling author. That octet, composed mostly in the 1970s and initially appearing in various journals, is reprinted here, along with five new tales, each introduced in brief by Francis. Field of Thirteen is a superbly crafted collection of thirteen tightly plotted tales that treats readers to murder, mystery, and mayhem in the world of horseracing. Most of the stories are horsey parables of revenge. A small-town newspaper editor plots against the restaurant that humiliated his guests; a mild expatriate Brit patiently pursues legal remedies against the lawyer who swindled him out of the bail money he put up for an acquaintance; a couple of means gets even with the social-climbing daughter who neglected her mother, their faithful groom; a timely accident puts paid to the plans of a hitman and the jockey who hired him. Enjoy free online English audiobook “Field of Thirteen”, a breathtaking novel by Dick Francis.
