Lake Effect

Although Cleveland PI Milan Jacovich, last seen in The Cleveland Connection, comes up against murder, violence, the mob, devious electioneering, a burgeoning love affair and even some timorous pedophilia, his new case is as flat as a Midwest cornfield. Jacovich returns a favor he owes to Victor Gaimari, stockbroker and scion of the Ohio mafia, and agrees to act as security chief for a woman running for mayor in a small exurban town. Candidate Barbara Corns, wife of a legitimate Gaimari client, is bashful, inept and going nowhere in her race against veteran incumbent Gayton True. Although True has a few skeletons in his closet (wifebeating, a kiddie-porn dealer brother-in-law), Barbara's campaign/manager husband (``I call all the shots'') refuses to use them. The hit-and-run death of True's wife, hidden plans for a gambling casino, Gaimari's secret backing of True and a would-be producer of kiddie-porn spark up the action only a little. Jacovich waxes nasty about the last but he's only in a four-cylinder dudgeon. We do learn the difference between ``kielbasi'' and ``klobasa''-Serbian and Slovenian words for the same spicy sausage-but even so, there's much sameness here. (Dec.)