The Lasko Tangent

A routine post-Watergate uncover-up investigation - begun when narrator Christopher Paget of the U.S. Economic Crimes Commission is assigned the job of ascertaining whether or not William Lasko ("The President's favorite industrialist") is guilty of stock manipulation. Chris suspects that more than financial swindles are involved when his first witness - the controller of Lasko Devices - is hit-and-run murdered on a Boston street right after telling Chris, "I've got a memo at home that will deliver the whole thing." And Chris' next contact, the man who has set up a dummy corporation for Lasko down on a Caribbean isle, disappears just as Chris arrives to interview him. The chase, which is rather slow and talky (though some of the talk is tart and sharp), eventually leads to the Massachusetts sanitarium where that Lasko employee is incarcerated. . . and then right to the White House. Naturally. Filled out with Chris' pleasant enough affair with a crisp government lady-in-power, this first novel provides no noticeable thrills, but it's slightly classier in tone than much of this genre, even as it runs its hero through a numbingly familiar gauntlet. (Kirkus Reviews)