{"product_id":"10-lb-penalty-isbn-9780425197455","title":"10 lb Penalty","description":"\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eNew York Times \u003c\/i\u003ebestselling author Dick Francis has been hailed as “a master of understated suspense” (\u003ci\u003eThe San Diego Union-Tribune\u003c\/i\u003e)\u003ci\u003e. \u003c\/i\u003eWith\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003ethis blockbuster novel, he lives up to his dazzling reputation, delivering the compelling story of a father and son who must work together to defeat a deadly adversary...\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eEven though Ben Juliard had always dreamt of becoming a jockey, he couldn’t say no when his father—a prominent politician—pulled some strings and got him a job in his campaign for Parliament. Now Ben needs to do more than smile for the cameras. With each step up on the ladder of power come new dangers to the aspiring candidate. And as the mysterious attacks grow ever more lethal, Ben discovers that politics can be the most perilous horse race of all...\u003cb\u003ePraise for \u003ci\u003e10 lb Penalty\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e“A winner in every sense of the word—A Pleasure to Read...A Treat.”—Associated Press\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Few things are more convincing than Dick Francis at Full gallop.”—\u003ci\u003eChicago Tribune\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e“[A] smooth, nimbly paced charmer.”—\u003ci\u003e\u003ci\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e“Fast-paced.”—\u003ci\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe Orlando Sentinel\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003eDick Francis\u003c\/b\u003e was born in South Wales in 1920. He was a young rider of distinction winning awards and trophies at horse shows throughout the United Kingdom. At the outbreak of World War II he joined the Royal Air Force as a pilot, flying fighter and bomber aircraft including the Spitfire and Lancaster. He became one of the most successful postwar steeplechase jockeys, winning more than 350 races and riding for Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother. After his retirement from the saddle in 1957, he published an autobiography, \u003ci\u003eThe Sport of Queens\u003c\/i\u003e, before going on to write more than forty acclaimed books. A three-time Edgar Award winner, he also received the prestigious Crime Writers’ Association’s Cartier Diamond Dagger, was named Grand Master by the Mystery Writers of America, and was awarded a CBE in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List in 2000. He died in February 2010, at age eighty-nine, and remains among the greatest thriller writers of all time.\u003cp\u003eTable of Contents\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eTitle Page\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eCopyright Page\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAcknowledgements\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eOne\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eTwo\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThree\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFour\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFive\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSix\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSeven\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eEight\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNine\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eTen\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eEleven\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eTwelve\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNew York Times Bestselling Author DICK FRANCIS\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e“[A] SMOOTH, NIMBLY PACED CHARMER.”\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Publishers Weekly\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e“FAST-PACED.”\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Orlando Sentinel\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e10 LB. PENALTY\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e bestselling author Dick Francis is “one of our most reliable storytellers, a master of understated suspense” (\u003ci\u003eThe San Diego Union-Tribune\u003c\/i\u003e). With this block-buster novel, he lives up to his dazzling reputation, delivering the compelling story of a father and son who must work together to defeat a deadly adversary ...\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eEven though Ben Juliard had always dreamed of becoming a jockey, he couldn’t say no when his father—a prominent politician—pulled some strings and got him a job in his campaign for Parliament. Now Ben needs to do more than smile for the cameras. With each step up on the ladder of power come new dangers to the aspiring candidate. And as the mysterious attacks grow ever more lethal, Ben discovers that politics can be the most perilous horse race of all ...\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“FEW THINGS ARE MORE CONVINCING THAN DICK FRANCIS AT A FULL GALLOP.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003e-Chicago Tribune\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“NOBODY SETS UP A MYSTERY BETTER THAN DICK FRANCIS.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003e—San Francisco Chronicle\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eRAVE REVIEWS FOR DICK FRANCIS\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“It’s either hard or impossible to read Mr. Francis without growing pleased with yourself: not only the thrill of vicarious competence imparted by the company of his heroes, but also the lore you collect as you go, feel like a field trip with the perfect guide.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e—\u003ci\u003eThe New York Times Book Review\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“One of the most reliable mystery writers working today ... Francis’s secret weapons are his protagonists. They are the kind of people you want for friends.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e—\u003ci\u003eDetroit News and Free Press\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“[Francis] has the uncanny ability to turn out simply plotted yet charmingly addictive mysteries.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e—\u003ci\u003eThe Wall Street Journal\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“A rare and magical talent... who never writes the same story twice ... Few writers have maintained such a high standard of excellence for as long as Dick Francis.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e—\u003ci\u003eThe San Diego Union-Tribune\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Francis just gets better and better ... It can’t be as easy as he makes it look, or all mystery writers would be as addictive.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e—\u003ci\u003eThe Charlotte Observer\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“After writing dozens of thrillers, Dick Francis always retains a first-novel freshness.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e—\u003ci\u003eThe Indianapolis Star\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“He writes about the basic building blocks of life—obligation, honor, love, courage, and pleasure. Those discussions come disguised in adventure novels so gripping that they cry out to be read in one gulp—then quickly reread to savor the details skipped in the first gallop through the pages.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003e—Houston Chronicle\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Dick Francis stands head and shoulders above the rest.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e—\u003ci\u003eOttawa Citizen\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eFiction by Dick Francis\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eNonfiction by Dick Francis\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eA JOCKEY’S LIFE THE SPORT OF QUEENS\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e10 LB. PENALTY\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eA Berkley Book \/ published by arrangement with the author\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePRINTING HISTORY\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eG. P. Putnam’s Sons edition \/ September 1997\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eJove edition \/ October 1998\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBerkley edition \/ August 2004\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eCopyright © 1997 by Dick Francis.\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll rights reserved.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNo part of this book may be reproduced, scanned or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFor information address: The Berkley Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eeISBN : 978-1-101-00720-4\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBERKLEY®\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBerkley Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBERKLEY and the “B” design are trademarks belonging to Penguin Group (USA) Inc.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eWith thanks to my grandson, .\u003c\/i\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eMATTHEW FRANCIS, \u003cbr\u003eAGED EIGHTEEN YEARS,\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cbr\u003eAND\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cbr\u003eWEATHERBYS\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cbr\u003eAND\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cbr\u003eNO. 10 DOWNING ST.\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eOne\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eGlue-sniffing jockeys don’t win the Derby.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI’d never sniffed glue in my life.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll the same, I stood before the man whose horses I rode and listened to him telling me he had no further use for my services. He sat behind his large antique paper-covered desk fidgeting with his clean fingernails. His hands were a yellowish white, very smooth.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“I have it on good authority,” he said.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“But I don’t!” I protested in bewilderment. “I’ve never sniffed glue or anything else. Certainly not cocaine. I’ve never even smoked pot. It’s not true.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eHe looked at me coldly with the knowing eyes of a rich, powerful, assured and physically bulky man who had inherited a good brain and a chunk of merchant bank, and trained racehorses prestigiously out of obsession.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI was not yet eighteen at that point and, I now know, immature for my age, though of course I wasn’t aware of it at the time. I felt helpless, though, in the face of his inaccurate certainty, and had no idea how to deal with it.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Sir Vivian ...,” I began with desperation, but he effortlessly cut me off with his heavier authoritative voice.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“You can clear off at once, Benedict,” he said. “I’ll not have my stable contaminated by rumors of a drug-taking jockey, even if he is an amateur and not much good.” He saw me flinch but went on relentlessly. “You’ll never be a top race rider. You’re too big, for one thing, or at least you will be in a year or two, and frankly you look clumsy on a horse. All arms and legs. In your hands, the most collected jumper turns in a sprawling performance. With that and an unsatisfactory reputation ... well, I no longer want you associated with my stable.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI stared at him numbly, hurt more deeply by his fairly brutal assessment of my lack of riding ability, which could perhaps be substantiated, rather than by the accusations of drug taking, which couldn’t.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAround me the familiar walls of his stable office seemed to recede, leaving me isolated with a thumping heart and no feeling below the ankles. All the framed photographs of past winners, all the bookshelves and the olive green wallpaper faded away. I saw only the stony face spelling out the effective end of my long-held dream of winning all races from the Grand National down.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI expect seventeen is a better age than most to be chopped off at the ambitious knees. It just didn’t feel like it at that moment of the slice of the ax.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Outside that window,” said Sir Vivian Durridge, pointing, “a car is waiting for you. The driver says he has a message for you. He’s been waiting a good hour or more, while you’ve been out riding exercise.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI followed the direction of his finger, and saw, some way across the raked gravel of the imposing entrance driveway to his porticoed domain, a large black car inhabited solely by a chauffeur in a peaked cap.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Who is it?” I asked blankly.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eVivian Durridge either didn’t know or wasn’t telling. He said merely, “On your way out, you can ask him.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“But, sir ...,” I began again, and dried to fresh silence in the continuing negation of his distrust.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“I advise you to clean up your act,” he said, making a gesture that directed me to leave. “And now, I have work to do.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eHe looked steadfastly down at his desk and ignored me, and after a few seconds I walked unsteadily over to the high polished door with its gilded knob and let myself out.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIt was unfair. I had not cried much in my life but I felt weak then and near to weeping. No one before had pitilessly accused me of something I hadn’t done. No  one had so ruthlessly despised my riding. I still had a thin skin.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNo other good trainer would let me into his stable if Vivian Durridge had kicked me out of his.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn a mist of bewildered misery I crossed the wide Durridge entrance hall, made my way through the heavy front door and crunched across the gravel to where the car and chauffeur waited.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI knew neither of them. The August morning sun gleamed on black spotless bodywork, and the chauf feur with the shiny black peak to his cap let down the window beside him and stretched out a black uniformed arm, silently offering me a white unaddressed envelope.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI took it. The flap was only lightly glued. I peeled it open, drew out a single white card from inside, and read the brief message.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eGet in the car.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eUnderneath an afterthought had been added.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003ePlease.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI looked back towards the big house from which I’d been so roughly banned and saw Vivian Durridge standing by his window, watching me. He made no movement: no reconsidering action, no farewell.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI understood none of it.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe handwriting on the card was my father’s.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI sat on the backseat of the car for almost an hour while the chauffeur drove at a slow pace through the  county of Sussex, south of London, approaching finally the seaside spread of Brighton.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eHe would answer none of my questions except to say that he was following instructions, and after a while I stopped asking. Short of jumping out and running free at any of the few traffic-light stops, it seemed I was going to go wherever my father had ordained, and as I had no fear of him I would, from long-conditioned habit, do what he asked.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI thought chiefly—and in a mixture of rage and unhappiness—of the scene in Durridge’s study, his words circling endlessly in memory and not getting more bearable as time went on.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe black car drifted past Regency town houses and open-fronted souvenir shops, past old grandeur and new world commercialism, and sighed to a stop on the seafront outside the main door of a large hotel of ancient French architectural pedigree with bright beach towels drying on its decorative wrought-iron balconies.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePorters appeared solicitously. The chauffeur climbed out of his seat and ceremoniously opened the door beside me and, thus prompted, I stood up into the sea air, hearing gulls crying and voices in the distance calling on the wet ebb-tide strand, smelling the salt on the wind and unexpectedly feeling the lift of spirits of the sand-castle holidays of childhood.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe chauffeur made me a small sketch of a bow and pointed at the hotel’s main door, and then, still without explaining, he returned to his driving seat and at a  convenient moment inserted himself into the flow of traffic and smoothly slid away.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Luggage, sir?” one of the porters suggested. He was barely older than I.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI shook my head. For luggage I wore the clothes suitable for first-lot August-morning exercise with the Durridge string: jodhpurs, jodhpur boots, short-sleeved sports shirt and harlequin-printed lightweight zipped jacket (unzipped). I carried by its chin-strap my shiny blue helmet. With a conscious effort I walked these inappropriate garments into the grand hotel, but I needn’t have worried: the once-formal lobby buzzed like a beehive with people looking normal in cutoff shorts, flip-flop sandals and message-laden T-shirts. The composed woman at the reception desk gave my riding clothes an incurious but definite assessment like a click on an identification parade and answered my slightly hoarse enquiry.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Mr. George Juliard?” she repeated. “Who shall I say is asking for him?”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“His son.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eShe picked up a telephone receiver, pressed buttons, spoke, listened, gave me the news.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Please go up. Room four-twelve. The lift is to your left.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eMy father was standing in an open doorway as I walked down a passage to locate four-twelve. I stopped as I approached him and watched him inspect me, as he customarily did, from my dark curly hair (impervious to straightening by water), to my brown  eyes, thin face, lean frame, five foot eleven (or thereabouts) of long legs to unpolished boots: not in any way an impressive experience for an ambitious parent.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Ben,” he said. He breathed down his nose as if accepting a burden. “Come in.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eHe tried hard always to be a good father, but gave no weight to my infrequent assurances that he succeeded. I was a child he hadn’t wanted, the accidental consequence of his teenage infatuation with a woman biologically just old enough to be his own mother. On the day I went to Brighton I was almost as old as he had been when he fathered me.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eOver the years I’d gleaned the details. There had been a hullabaloo in both extended families when they were told of the pregnancy, an even worse fuss (product of the times) when my mother refused an abortion, and a frosty turning of backs at the hasty (and happy) wedding.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe marriage-day photograph was the only record I had of my mother, who ironically died of preeclampsia at my birth, leaving her very young husband literally holding the baby with his envisaged bright future in ruins, so it was said.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"G.P. Putnam's Sons","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46302005526757,"sku":"NP9780425197455","price":8.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780425197455.jpg?v=1767720110","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/10-lb-penalty-isbn-9780425197455","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}