LEXINGTON, KY — June 7, 2005 —
Dead Heat is a story of obsessions — of people driven to pursue their dreams and their desires at whatever cost. Jill Aspen, fleeing the demons of her past, finds a job with horse trainer Jake Fontana and an ally in Sal “Bones” Righetti, ex-mob enforcer, jock’s agent, and wily horseplayer. Righetti vows to help Aspen break free from her past, just as he has done, while Fontana provides a potential vehicle to stardom. This is Tumultuous, a horse Fontana trains that one day may carry all of them to what Bones thinks of as the “rainbow’s end.”
Aspen’s determination to become a great jockey is just one of the many obsessions driving the characters in */Dead Heat /*and putting them in harm’s way. Fontana is tortured by the memory of his beloved wife, Maria. Righetti is consumed with winning the next pick six and with protecting Jill Aspen. Horse breeder Paul Furman is fixated on his race for the Senate while hiding a terrible secret.
These obsessions collide in William Murray’s finely rendered account of racetrack life.
Dead Heat is the final novel for William Murray, who died in March 2005. Often described as America’s answer to Dick Francis, Murray was also a journalist, playwright, and 30-year veteran of
The New Yorker. He wrote four non-fiction books as well as nine novels involving the world of horse racing, including
When the Fat Man Sings, Tip on a Dead Crab, and
A Fine Italian Hand. Two novels,
The Sweet Ride and
Malibu, were produced for a feature film and a TV miniseries, respectively. Murray lived in San Diego, California, and was a regular at Del Mar racetrack.
Advanced praise for
Dead Heat:
“You can smell the sweet feed and Vetrolin, the details are so good. Dead Heat crosses the finish line ahead of all the others.”
—Rita Mae Brown
Mystery Author
“One in awhile, a book comes along that sneaks into your soul and sets up shop for good. /Dead Heat /could be that book. William Murray takes the reader on a thrilling ride to the peaks of the racing game, with side trips down dark, twisting alleys of human behavior and haunting intrigue. Murray, a rare man of letters, saved his best for last, a story that belongs on the shelf beside the best of Dashiell Hammett and James Cain.”
— Jay Hovdey
—
Daily Racing FormPublication date: September 2005
ISBN: 1-58150-131-5
Pages: 256; Bound Size: 6” x 9”
Retail price: $24.95 Cloth
_Available at your local bookstore or from Exclusively Equine _
_1-800-582-5604 (
www.ExclusivelyEquine.com)_
Distributed to bookstores by National Book Network
1-800-462-6420 (
www.nbnbooks.com)
Eclipse Press is the award-winning book publishing division of Blood-Horse Publications, publishers of /The Blood-Horse; The Horse; TBH MarketWatch; Keeneland /magazine; the official /Kentucky Derby/ and /Breeders’ Cup/ souvenir magazines; and equine-related books, videos, CD-ROMs, and annual references. Blood-Horse Publications also operates a family of popular websites including bloodhorse.com, The Horse.com, EclipsePress.com, and Keenelandmagazine.com. In addition, Blood-Horse Publications operates Exclusively Equine (
www.ExclusivelyEquine.com), the Official Store of Blood-Horse Publications. /The Blood-Horse, The Horse, Eclipse Press, Exclusively Equine, /and /TBH MarketWatch /are registered trademarks of Blood-Horse Publications.
