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Architect Lee Morris is one of the most individual narrators in modern crime fiction; in Dick Francis under-rated Decider, he must battle to save Stratton Park racecourse
Lee Morris is an architecturally trained builder in his mid-thirties who specializes in restoring "ruins," such as his own (literally) breath-taking barn converted into a house in which he lives with his six sons and Amanda, his lovely, but emotionally estranged wife. Lee and Amanda married young and painfully in love, but have gradually grown apart. But Amanda loves having children, and Lee loves having a family, so a marriage of convenience has evolved. Lee is also one of the few shareholders in Stratton Park racecourse who is not a Stratton by name, but that is only because his late mother divorced Lord Stratton’s son Keith and remarried, to Lee’s father. Part of the divorce settlement included a few shares in the racecourse. Now Stratton Park is on its last legs, and the manager and Clerk of the Course, in desperation, beg Lee to get involved, if only to distract the feuding heirs from their internecine squabbling. One faction wishes to sell the course to building developers, while the other part is adamant that they want to develop the racecourse. Reluctantly, Lee agrees to look in at the next shareholder’s meeting. He is astonished at the ferocity with which many of the family greet his presence, even though he knows that the Strattons have sailed through the generations buying, blackmailing or browbeating any opposition out of their way; even so, he is taken aback at the sheer hate that emanates from the vicious Keith and his children. Nonetheless, Lee slowly but surely becomes involved; he is nearly blown up in an act of sabotage that endangers his five older sons, and realizes that this is one fight that he cannot walk away, even as the depths to which most of the Stratton family will plumb are revealed. The Stratton family are egomaniacal monsters – even the most appealing ones – but gradually most of them realize that Lee is sincere. This simply places him greater danger. Lee is beaten up, further aggravating his injuries, and then as the story crescendos, has to run to save his sons from death. There are those who argue that Francis’ stories are formulaic, and there is an element of truth in the fact that they revolve around the world of horse-racing. But architect Lee Morris is one of the most individual and iconoclastic narrators of modern crime fiction, the setting encompasses far more than the world of horse-flesh, and if the emotional resolution is improbable, it is logical and satisfying. Decider is a book to read and read again.
The copyright of the article Decider by Dick Francis in Modern British Fiction is owned by Colin Harvey. Permission to republish Decider by Dick Francis in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
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