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Title: Great Horse Racing Mysteries by John McEvoy ISBN: 1-58150-052-1 Publisher: Eclipse Press Pub. Date: September, 2000 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4 (4 reviews)
Rating: 1
Summary: Great Horse Racing Mysteries
Comment: Ripped off by Amazon. Maximum price of this book was $24.95 new through the vendor Half.com. Amazon charged $38.94. Shame on me for trusting Amazon. It will not happen again because I am closing my account with these rip off artists. Be very careful before you purchase from this company.
Rating: 5
Summary: True Tales from the Track
Comment: "Great Horse Racing Mysteries" was awarded the Benjamin Franklin Award for best mystery/suspense book of 2000. It presents twelve true racetrack mysteries in chronological order beginning in 1932 with the death of Phar Lap, the great Australian Thoroughbred who won his first and only race in the United States before his mysterious demise. The author interviewed the few remaining eyewitnesses to Phar Lap's spectacular American debut, including Noble Threewit who is still involved with horses at age ninety-two. (I hope someone names a good horse after Noble Threewit---one of the most euphonious monikers in racing. Hint to Thoroughbred breeders: Clyde Van Dusen was named after a trainer, and both trainer and gelding went on to win the 1929 Kentucky Derby).
Anyway, Phar Lap was put on display in a Melbourne museum, and John McEvoy has presented a very detailed and even-handed account of his death. Did the "Australian Man O'War" die of arsenic poisoning? Was the poisoning deliberate, or was he put out to graze on grass that had been sprayed with insecticide? The author presents all of the remaining pieces of this fascinating puzzle.
There are other mysterious deaths in "Great Horse Racing Mysteries": a trainer; jockeys; a racing commission official; William Woodward, the owner of Nashua, who was shot by his own wife; the decline and fall of Calumet Farm after the death of the stallion Alydar.
McEvoy, a former reporter for the "Daily Racing Form" also describes two Thoroughbred kidnappings, a racetrack arson, and two stories involving the possible drugging of Derby horses---one to help the horse win, and another to make the horse lose.
The latter story was a shocker for me, because the horse involved was Holy Bull, one of my favorite Thoroughbreds. The eventual 1984 horse of the year, "ran the worst race of his life in the Derby, a departure from form so startling and disturbing as to raise numerous questions in its aftermath. His horrified owner-trainer [Jimmy Croll] subsequently became convinced this dismal effort resulted from the fleet gray colt's having been drugged prior to the Derby."
Once again, the author presents all of the evidence. Even great Thoroughbreds throw in a clunker now and then. But Holy Bull was not only fast, he was courageous. As Tom Dawson of ESPN's 'Racing Across America' series said, "It's so hard to get the horses with the talent and charisma...[Holy Bull] was the real thing."
If Holy Bull was drugged before the Derby---well, I'm glad to see him doing so well at stud. His son, Macho Uno won the Breeder's Cup Juvenile and an Eclipse award last year, giving Holy Bull's true fans the hope that one of his get will win the Kentucky Derby in some future May, and wipe away the only spot of tarnish on their sire's racing record.
"Great Horse Racing Mysteries" should appeal to horse lovers and mystery fans alike. It is a well-researched, thrilling page-turner.
Rating: 5
Summary: Great Horse Racing Mysteries
Comment: Wow! You can tell this author was a newspaperman, yet this book reads like fiction. You don't have to be a racing fan to love this book, though if you are, you will enjoy the constant stream of racing stats - stuff you always wanted to know or stuff you forgot. It makes you want to take McEvoy out for dinner and pick his brain about all things racing. Each chapter is a roller coaster ride - you might not solve the mystery, but it's a wild ride. See the Woodward chapter. It makes Marilyn Monroe and Joe DiMaggio's marriage look like a walk in the park! The story unfolds like a movie in your mind. All the chapters are told with juicy details and multiple perspectives. Pray for a follow up book.
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Title: Wild Ride : The Rise and Fall of Calumet Farm Inc., America's Premier Racing Dynasty by Anne Hagedorn Auerbach ISBN: 0805042423 Publisher: Henry Holt & Company, Inc. Pub. Date: 15 December, 1995 List Price(USD): $16.00 |
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Title: The Perfect Ride by Gary Stevens, Bill Shoemaker, Mervyn Kaufman ISBN: 0806524502 Publisher: Citadel Trade Pub. Date: May, 2003 List Price(USD): $15.95 |
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Title: Secretariat: The Making of a Champion by William Nack ISBN: 0306811332 Publisher: DaCapo Press Pub. Date: 02 April, 2002 List Price(USD): $16.95 |
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Title: Ruffian : Burning From the Start by Jane Schwartz ISBN: 0345450000 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 30 April, 2002 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: Stud : Adventures in Breeding by Kevin Conley ISBN: 1582343322 Publisher: Bloomsbury USA Pub. Date: 02 April, 2003 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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