Boston private investigator Spenser enters the dangerous world of horse racing when he is hired to oversee security for Hugger Mugger, a two-year-old colt destined to become the next Secretariat.

"Maggie Atwood and Becky McCabe--mother and daughter, both champion riders--vowed to never, ever, go up against one another, until the tense, harrowing competitions leading to the Paris Olympics"--Dust jacket flap.

At the rock-bottom end of the sport of kings sits the ruthless and often violent world of cheap horse racing, where trainers and jockeys, grooms and hotwalkers, loan sharks and touts all struggle to take an edge, or prove their luck, or just survive. Lord of Misrule follows five characters -- scarred and lonely dreamers in the American grain -- through a year and four races at Indian Mound Downs, downriver from Wheeling, West Virginia. Horseman Tommy...