'If you want to bet on numbers, go to a casino. If you want theatre, go to the races.' - Les Carlyon
All his life, Andrew Rule has watched racing's heroes and villains, dreamers and schemers.
In Chance, he distils the daring, the desperation and danger of the track, peeling back some of racing's most famous and infamous moments, its celebrations and its secrets, the grittiness behind the glitz.
There are stories of those who set the odds and those who take them, betting plunges planned more carefully than bank robberies, of tricky trainers, reckless jockeys and bold bookmakers.
Tough and sometimes tender, dark and sometimes funny, Chance transcends the industry they call the sport of kings.
Author Information
Multi-award-winning journalist Andrew Rule broke into metropolitan newspapers when he suggested to the then editor of The Age that the rival Herald had offered him a job. At the time, he was the only cadet reporter in captivity to have ridden the winner of a horse race.
Rule went on to cover some of the most notorious Australian stories of recent decades - and live to tell the tale. He broke the Jennifer Tanner case, which resulted in an inquest finding being quashed and serving policeman Denis Tanner being named as a killer by the Coroner.
Rule has written, edited or published more than 30 true crime books - including the best-selling Underbelly series with John 'Sly' Silvester, which inspired the television drama on Melbourne's gangland war. He and Silvester ghosted the Chopper books that led to the acclaimed feature film starring Eric Bana.
He is now an associate editor of the Australia's biggest daily, the Herald Sun, for which he writes features and columns. He wrote the definitive biography of businessman Kerry Stokes, published in 2015, and the ward-winning biography of the world champion racehorse Winx in 2018.