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Not by a Long Shot: A Season at a Hard Luck Horse Track
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Not by a Long Shot: A Season at a Hard Luck Horse Track
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by T.D. Thornton
Sales Rank : 490649
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Hardcover: 368 pages
Publisher: PublicAffairs April 2, 2007
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1586484494
ISBN-13: 978-1586484491
Product Dimensions:
9.3 x 6.5 x 1.4 inches
Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
From Publishers Weekly
In this intermittently engaging book, Thornton narrates a long season at Boston's Suffolk Downs racetrack, a blue-collar gambling bastion struggling for survival in the casino age. Thornton—who has spent his life around racetracks as a gambler, groom, reporter, announcer and PR man—possesses a deep sympathy for and understanding of the dynamics and contradictions that sustain this threatened world. As our tour director, he introduces the reader to hard-luck horses and eccentric jockeys, gambling scandals and betting strategies, as well as the ice and rain that inevitably make the sport of kings in New England a muddy mess. Thornton's credentials are impeccable, he has unrivaled access, and he delivers keen observations in a style that alternates between workmanlike and poetic. However, the various story lines he traces—a jockey paralyzed in a racing accident, an old gray famous for finishing second, a shady owner, and his father's small stable—are not strong enough to hold the book together or draw the reader all the way in. Any horseracing fan who wants a peek at the inner workings of a track will want to pick this up, but the attention of the general public might wander. (Apr.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Product Review
"A Good Read: True horseracing fans will enjoy T.D. Thornton's new bookwe couldn't put it down" -- New York Daily News, March 30, 2007
"An honest top-of-the-grandstand overview [The] book has the drama and flow of an episodic novel." -- Illinois Racing News, June, 2007
"Legitimate literature and the racetrack have hit the quarter pole together again." -- The Blood Horse, April 24, 2007
"Like all good narrative nonfiction, this scrappy outsider pulls you in early and won't let go until the bitter(sweet) end." -- Louisville Courier-Journal on Derby Day, 5/5
"The book covers the ground of a mile-and-a-half route but reads like a five-and-a-half-furlong sprint." -- New Hampshire Union Leader, May 1, 2007
"There's no doubt Thornton can write. Witness a poetic turn among the 'stoopers.'" -- Racing Post, July 8, 2007
"With a `caustically honest' eye Thornton succeeds in illuminating a truer side of Thoroughbred racing [A] steed of a book." -- Boston Globe, May 19, 2007
"a truly unique perspectiveWe see Thornton's more introspective, insightful side." -- Lowell Sun, April 13, 2007
"an interesting behind-the-scenes look at a business that relies on luck, unpredictable athletes, and statistics to survive" -- Pahrump (NV) Valley Times, Aprilg 18, 2007
"provides a good picture of the plight of small-time racing" -- Library Journal, April 1, 2007
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