False Profits

Political science professor Everson ( Suicide Squeeze ) brings his knowledge of arcane history to the forefront in this mystery for conspiracy buffs, but he shoots his story in the foot with self-indulgent humor. Fast-food-loving punster PI Bobby Miles admits to being an ``undereducated plodder'' who is out of his league trying to comprehend the ``nouveau politics'' of Springfield, Ill. His partner, Mitch Norris, a cigar-smoking opera buff who reads Umberto Eco, is more appealing but too little in evidence, while other characters (for example, Miles's wife, a Faulkner specialist) seem extraneous. The Abraham Lincoln Legal Association hires the partners to check out a man who claims to possess documents incriminating Honest Abe in a plot to kill Mormon leader Joseph Smith. A whistling whittler, an alcoholic, a womanizing ex-politician, a former FBI agent and other unsavory types cross Miles and Norris's path as they traverse western Illinois, encountering several dead bodies along the way. Little in this slight narrative justifies even the brief time it takes to read a book written primarily in words of one or two syllables. ( Aug. )