Caitlin Summerfield rushes home to Nelson on New Zealand’s South Island when she hears her mother is in a coma. Despite being a doctor there’s not much she can do for her mother’s health but she can take care of her farm. Shirley Summerfield, along with five other businesses, is in competition for a lucrative contract to provide eventing horses to an American outfit so Caitlin, helped by the farm’s neighbour Dom and a young girl who loves horses, Kasey, attempts to keep things afloat until her mother is back on her feet. Unfortunately it seems one of the competitors is using dirty tricks to get rid of the competition and a series of ‘accidents’ and near misses befall Caitlin and the horses.

I thoroughly enjoyed meeting the characters in Bold Blood who, apart from the killer(s), all seem like people you wouldn’t mind meeting in real life which is not always the case in crime fiction, even with the good guys. Caitlin’s homecoming is traumatic as she doesn’t have a good relationship with her mother and she is reminded everywhere she turns of her father and younger brother who both died years earlier. Despite this though she gets stuck into the work that needs to be done and is very practical and appears to be just the sort of woman you’d want in a crisis. Dom and Kasey share similar troublesome issues with at least one parent each yet are both optimistic people who display a good dose of humour in the face of adversity which is one of my favourite things about the book. Jean is a wise older woman who has been like a mother to Caitlin and she adds a nice dimension to the book though it annoyed me that she kept trying to mend the rift between Caitlin and her mother when common sense would suggest letting sleeping dogs lie.

The main story is well crafted and, especially towards the end, very exciting. However as a mystery it’s not terribly complex (a simple process of elimination really) and while I wouldn’t quite call it a ‘cosy’ there’s not much of a procedural element to speak of either. However the people were interesting enough and events unfolded at such a pace that I was always keen to find out what would happen next to all the characters, including the poor horses. I like to see worlds different to my own depicted in fiction so enjoyed learning about the different aspects of eventing, which I assume were shown realistically as Kelly is a former participant in the sport. Very occasionally the book goes overboard with insider jargon and for me there’s a bit too much time devoted to pairing all the players off neatly in a romantic sense but these are minor quibbles with an otherwise solid story.

The book had something of a sense of its New Zealand setting including some glimpses into elements of Maori culture and some mentions of local wildlife but in the main I thought we could have been in any farming or ‘horsey’ community in the world. Though perhaps I am not familiar enough* with the place to have picked up on other things with are particularly New Zealand-ish.

Bold Blood is a fast-paced and entertaining tale with many likable characters and a humourous feel. I’d especially recommend it for animal loving readers and those who like a dash of romance with their crime. ( )

BOLD BLOOD is an assured debut crime fiction novel by an established New Zealand children's writer.
Essentially it is a good read, with a well constructed plot, and authoritative and authentic feeling background. As I read I couldn't help comparing it to works of English writer Dick Francis and Australian writer Peter Klein. It is probably an unfair comparison but one that readers of equine crime fiction will inevitably make. And BOLD BLOOD is very passable. I thought too that Lindy Kelly brought a female voice to this aspect of the genre. The character of Kasey the strapper/stable hand is particularly well drawn.

The cast of characters is a striking one, but I'm not sure I really believed in the "big contract" that caused all the mayhem. I think also Kelly ended up killing too many characters off and Dom's reaction to the death of his own father is rather flat.

While there is plenty of room for a sequel, Caitlin and Dom having plenty of issues to resolve, I don't think that I can see this as the beginning of a series starring these main protagonists. Caitlin Summerfield I think would have considerable difficulty in maintaining any objective interest in a criminal investigation. Perhaps Kelly will just let her go back to being a doctor.

Nevertheless a good read. If you like crime fiction relating to horses then you'll like this one. ( )

Lindy Kelly is an experienced eventing rider in New Zealand and she's taken the idea of write what you know to heart. BOLD BLOOD is set deep in the world of horse eventing - although for the author's sake, you have to hope that some of the action in this book is made up!

Dr Caitlin Summerfield was raised with horses. By a mother that she most definitely does not get on with, who she still blames for the premature death of the father and brother she adored. Called back to the family farm after her mother has an accident and is in hospital, deep in a coma, Caitlin has to leave city life, medicine and her boyfriend behind to step into the training and riding of her mother's horses until it becomes clear whether her mother is ever likely to recover. On the farm, accidents continue to happen and pretty quickly it becomes obvious that somebody doesn't want the business to continue.

There is a lot of detail in this book about eventing. Training, teaching, showing and working with horses is definitely the main point of this book. The information is interwoven with the mystery of why Caitlin's mother was attacked, and why threatening things happen at events - and at home. Whilst the horse aspects are obviously presented by an author who really knows their stuff, it doesn't read like Horse Eventing 101. Part of the reason for that is the terrific, dry funny humour - peopled a lot by a young strapper who steps up to help out when things start to get difficult. Kasey is a wonderful character - full of teenage attitude and misfit vulnerability, with a tremendous sense of irony and a fine line in bad language. She had me laughing out loud at just about every outing. Unfortunately Kasey rapidly outshone Caitlin. Caitlin was a little over-earnest, and there was such an inevitability to the various storylines around her that she struggled to stay sympathetic or even interesting at points. Especially as very early on the book - enter Dom McEwan. Softly spoken, gorgeous looking next-door-neighbour - the requisite love interest / strong male figure who appeared on the scene and the romantic tension was immediately switched on.

BOLD BLOOD is very much a romantic thriller - with all the will they / won't they / ooo ick must you do that here (as Kasey puts it) going on in. There is a reasonably good plot idea with a lurking threat that takes a while to materialise into a motive and a list of possible suspects. But the mystery elements do struggle for air in amongst the horses and the romance. That, combined with a hefty dose of fem-jep cataclysmic ramped up ending, leading to all threads neatly tied up (including the personal), meant a very mixed reaction. Whilst there were aspects of the book I liked, there wasn't enough of the believable and palpable thriller components to compensate for the overt romance and the predictability of the personal story of Caitlin. Having said that, BOLD BLOOD could work for well for fans of romantic thrillers who would probably rate that particular aspect of the book much higher. ( )