The Hoffa Connection

Having solved the murder of JFK (The Grassy Knoll) and the Tate-LaBianca killings (The Helter Skelter Murders), Lt. Columbo now digs into the mysterious disappearance of Teamsters president Jimmy Hoffa. As in the previous volumes, it's a present-day crime that sets the rumpled L.A. cop on the chase-here, the murder of Regina, a raunchy, Madonna-like rock star. The killing and the killers are shown, just as in the TV episodes; the intrigue comes from seeing how Columbo will solve the case. What might have been a perfect crime goes astray when Regina is accidentally cut as two members of her entourage, acting on orders from a mysterious superior, force the star to stay in her swimming pool at knifepoint until she becomes exhausted and drowns. What follows involves mob conspiracy and counter-conspiracy-and lots of padding and some ludicrous plot twists, with the Hoffa linkage adding next to nothing to the weak and pointless story. To cap it off, Columbo's tried-and-true TV shtick, from the omnipresent cigar to the old raincoat to the verbal mannerisms, just don't work in print. This is one of those books that's worth reading only if your TV set is on the blink. (July)