Margaret Truman/Murder in the House/344 pp.

When I was a sophomore in college, in a class about The Detective Novel, I wrote a paper contrasting the works of Margaret Truman, daughter of President Harry Truman, and Eliot Roosevelt, son of Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt. If memory serves, I liked Roosevelt's mysteries better back then, and this book by Truman did nothing to change my opinion. Written in 1997, the book attempts to deal with the world of post-Soviet Russia, where the Communists, capitalists and criminals are fighting for control. Congressman Paul Latham is murdered in the US Capitol building; we know pretty much from the outset "whodunit", and the rest of the book seems to consist of the police and other characters catching up with us. Add to this a Congressional page with a really bad southern drawl, and a highly illogical, anticlimactic "climax" on the floor of the House of Representatives. The one enjoyable part of the book was the Congressman's friend, law professor Mackensie Smith, who as the story's hero tries to uncover the killer and clean up Latham's name. But even he doesn't solve the crime; the murderer is revealed while Smith is off having a nice dinner (and getting shot at) with his wife.