Dick Francis's usual hero is a loner without visible family; for a change, Ian Pembroke is digging into the murder of his stepmother and the repeated attempts on his father's life. Don't start imagining loving domesticity, however. The murdered stepmother is Malcolm Pembroke's fifth wife and Ian is the fifth of his nine children. In fact, the entire pool of suspects is the Pembroke family. Not exactly Happy Families. I've read references to Happy Families for years - finally looked it up. It is, as I was fairly certain, a British children's game, but not, as I imagined, a board game. It is a card game which sounds very much like the game of Authors which we played as children. It also has absolutely nothing to do with this story.
Ian has been estranged from his father for three years - ever since he strongly advised his dad against marrying his fifth wife - and his father decked him and broke his nose. Now that said wife has been murdered and there have been a couple of attempts on his own life, Malcolm (his children all called him by his given name) has called on Ian to serve as his bodyguard. And the evidence indicates that the murderer is one of the family.
At least we have a somewhat limited suspect pool. Not as limited as it might be given the extent of the family, but still less than the entire population of England. By the way, Ian makes his way as an amateur jockey - so the racing connection is maintained. The title, however, seems to come from some American racing slang which Malcolm picks up along the way.
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