Sixteen Horses

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In the dark days that follow, the town slips into panic and paranoia. Everything is not as it seems. Anyone could be a suspect. And as Cooper finds herself unable to leave town, Alec is stalked by an unseen threat. The two investigators race to uncover the truth behind these frightening and insidious mysteries – no matter the cost. Het eerste hoofdstuk trekt je het boek in. Het is bondig geschreven, geeft meteen een mooie spanningsboog en weet een grote nieuwsgierigheid te ontluiken. Helaas zakt dit alles meteen in als het boek haar tweede hoofdstuk opent. Verwarring na verwarring komt aan het licht en als er eindelijk een draad lijkt te zijn vastgeknoopt, kom je al snel tot de ontdekking dat die weer begint te rafelen, waardoor er weer tal van vragen ontspruiten. Het lijkt alsof Greg Buchanon zijn favoriete films en boeken bij elkaar op een hoop heeft gegooid, hieruit de leukste en indrukwekkendste elementen heeft getrokken en dit in een trommel heeft gegooid zonder naar de uitkomst te kijken. Het resultaat is een grote warboel die tot aan bijna het eind van de vertelling overeind blijft staan. De vraag of een uitgeverij er wel naar heeft gekeken, ontkiemt dan ook onmiddellijk na het dichtslaan van het boek. Waar komen de lovende recensies en de daaruit voortgebrachte hype toch vandaan? Of zouden de uitgevers het ook niet meer getrokken hebben en van ellende maar een prachtige cover erop geplakt hebben?

Greg Buchanan writes with an edgy, unnerving style, a seen from the corner of your eye feel to the story unfolding which is both haunting and incredibly powerful. There is no path of least resistance to this book, it creeps up in you in ways I can’t describe and in the end, when all is said and done, the almost dreamlike feel to the read will linger with you. The very sensitive reader will no doubt be shaken by the fate of the animals in the story, and that fact may cause a good many of them to leave the narration unfinished, opting for something lighter and perhaps less assaulting on the emotions. Where do I start with this one? A first time author I believe? If so, what a debut! Maybe not without it’s faults, and I’m sure it will not be for many people but, I was absolutely mesmerised by this. Greg Buchanan’s debut thriller Sixteen Horses is set in a small English seaside community, and follows the discovery of 16 severed horse heads on a remote farm, partially buried. The mystery soon unravels into much more than just murdered animals, drawing the reader in with secrets and a multi-layered crime. I have trained racehorses and practised as a vet for many years, and my motivation for working in this sport – like everyone in the industry – is my deep respect for thoroughbred horses. I fully understand why there is a lot of anger directed towards the protesters today by my industry colleagues and lovers of the sport.Alec is not a particularly good detective, so I was more and more fascinated to see his side of the story play out. Cooper is the big-hearted vet with an eye for crime so she was much more switched on. That being said, there never seemed to be a huge amount of progress made in the case. A lot of the secrets just came out all at once at the end. It starts out with the discovery of sixteen killed horses, just their heads - oh, and their tails - in a muddy field. The local police detective and an animal forensic scientist set out to learn what killed them and who and how and why. All very standard for a thriller/horror/mystery read. (I am so not sure which genre this book really is.) But the more you read, the deeper into the mud of the story and the characters' lives you get. (And it is super muddy.) The locale: A fading seaside town, which we are reminded of at least a dozen times. Closed-up shops. Abandoned buildings. The ruined facades of amusement arcades, and so on. it was such a chore to read these povs I swear. Obviously this crime turned personal but the actual people at the heart of this story are so. Damn. Boring. All of them are sad and edgy but not in an interesting way that makes you more curious. Alec is weird. Why do u think you’re in love with cooper? He’s so boring. He’s as interesting as toilet paper. Cooper? Oh god she’s like an android. Is she even human? Simon is the most lamest “villain” I’ve ever read good god.

A dead man sits in a room...there is something moving inside his stomach. His right eye is no longer there. Seagulls swooped from roof to roof. Middle-aged couples sat on benches, mostly silent. The air smelt of dust, salt, skin, tobacco.”Alle personages in het dorp hebben zo hun geheimen. In het echt weet je ook niet altijd wat er achter iemands voordeur gebeurt, maar hier wordt alles uitvergroot en benadrukt. Original, beautifully written, terrifying and haunting' - Sophie Hannah, author of Haven't They Grown Nearly all Saturday’s drama happened early on during the first circuit with eight either falling or unseating at the first two fences. In the previous nine years there were a total of 17 who fell or were unseated over the first two fences. Sixteen Horses is a powerful story encased in an even more powerful narration, in which love and cruelty rise, intermingle, and become the same, but by doing so, mostly overwhelms the essentials of the plot. Cooper verifies that the heads are of sixteen horses. The animals belong to various residents of Ilmarsh, and most were stabled at Elton’s Riding Academy and Livery. Several others were independents, like Michael Stafford’s Annie, who pulled a carriage at the local seaside arcade. All the animals had been sedated at the request of their owners because of the Guy Fawkes celebration and fireworks.

From its grizzly opening onwards, Greg Buchanan’s debut Sixteen Horses owes much more to the British gothic tradition than to crime fiction. There is, on the surface a crime to be solved, and two investigators. But that investigation, for the most part, is just an excuse to get under the skin of the setting and the cruel and violent secrets that it holds.

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Since the modifications to the course in 2013 when the cores of the fences were softened, the pattern of the race has changed and the average number of fallers has dropped from 11.6 to five. The first fence, with no drop on it now, is no longer the bogey fence it once was. Greg Buchanan is a BAFTA-longlisted writer for interactive and screen. His acclaimed debut novel SIXTEEN HORSES was selected for BBC Two's Between The Covers and was a Waterstones Thriller of the Month. A TV adaptation produced by Gaumont Television is on the way. His second novel CONSUMED is out summer 2023.