Presidents Son

Everyone in this Washington roman a clef seems to have a skeleton in the closet. But rapidly the secrets are being discovered and used as leverage by Presi- dent Donald Marshall, the conservative show-biz veteran who is cranking up his reelection campaign by corralling support for a big weapons sale to the Sudan. The President's own skeleton is his son D. J. (Don Jr.), a gay actor who has entered a marriage of convenience but still spends time with his male lover Terry, a drug-abusing mechanic. Soon, however, nervous and overzealous campaign officials with FBI and CIA connections have silenced Terry permanently andto push through the weapons saleinstigated the assassination of Egypt's leader. Former White House consultant Kraus is good on the inner workings of high office and sympathetic to both generations of the first family, but the melodrama and paranoia of this fast-moving novel get out of hand. (June)