Passing the Reins

It is difficult to read this goofy action/adventure novel as anything but a spoof. Hofer (The Ebola Factor) aims for suspense and winds up with melodrama in presenting the mystery of the betrayal and assassination of an aging former U.S. intelligence agent. The father of two sons by different wives, Ian Frazer leaves a cryptic memoir on computer disks for his younger son to unravel. The plot then blurs into a cross-country romance and comic opera car chase across Europe without further reference to the disks. Elder son James, a rising star in the State Department, locks eyes across a crowded room with a Santa Monica TV newswoman, and knows instantly they are meant for each other. When they finally crawl out of his hotel room bed, they drive across the U.S. to tell their families of their undying love. On a lark in Russia, stepsister Dagmar is kidnapped, and her rescue has the entire family racing through Europe. Cluttered with a hodgepodge of loosely delineated characters, spiced with incestuous yearnings and mired in a morass of insignificant details, the key to the plot is at long last revealed, involving the CIA's interest in congressional funding for military weapons. Most readers will not stick around for the unveiling of the less-than-thrilling secret. (Apr.)