STEVE ALLEN – The Talk Show Murders. Delacorte Press, hardcover, 1982. Dell, paperback, 1983.

   It so happens that I think Steve Allen is an unrecognized genius. If you take a look at the ratings of his last few television ventures, I think you’ll agree on at least half of that statement.

   The fact remains that this is his twenty-fourth book, and some of them are a sight more serious than Bop Fables, which was his first. There was Ripoff: A Look at Corruption in America, for example, a factual expose of white collar crime in this country — not exactly what you’d expect to see as number one on the laugh parade.

   This is his first mystery novel. [FOOTNOTE.] Being a celebrity of some renown, Steve Allen should expect to sell a few more copies of this book than would the author of your average whodunit detective story. I’m happy for Mr. Allen, but I’m caught in a quandary of mixed emotions, since the book is only marginally better than that same average whodunit detective story mentioned above.

   Naturally, the subject matter [talk show murders] is an ideal one. The first death occurs on Toni Tennille’s show, the second on Johnny Carson. Phil Donahue is next, followed by Dick Cavett, then a grand finale on The Merv Griffin Show.

   Steve Allen no longer has a show to call his own — what a shame!- but he knows his way around backstage — and frontstage — and his capsule descriptions of the other hosts no longer his competition are the other reason you’ll read this book,

   The first, of course, is the mystery. The sequence of killings quickly becomes a personal challenge aimed directly at Roger Dale, the private eye working on the case. Roger Dale is a PI with an eye for PR — public relations, that is. All of the victims are advance-guard members of the sexual revolution presumed to be sweeping the country, another clue for Dale to add to his PP of the killer — the psychological profile.

   In the end, just as they always used to do, all of the suspects are gathered together in one room — in this case, the nation’s living room!– live and direct, as they always say, to find out who the guilty one is. It is the talk show to end all talk shows- and if it hadn’t worked, it probably would have.

   As a detective-story writer, Allen does not play fair in the classical sense. Even Roger Dale himself is not sure whom he’ll name as the killer before he finally wrings a confession out of him/her while still on the air. There are no clues for the reader to eagerly snap up along the way.

   The book is still nothing less than a huge amount of fun to read, which in this case has to be the number one criterion.

Rating: B.

FOOTNOTE:   As it turns out (not too surprisingly, perhaps) Steve Allen did not actually write this book. The author responsible, in this case, was Walter J. Sheldon. The book must have been a success, saleswise, since there were nine more in the series, all written by Robert Westbrook.

   I see that I did not mention that Steve Allen is actually a character in The Talk Show Murders — perhaps as the narrator — as he was in all of the additional ones. I do not know if PI Roger Dale ever showed up again. I do not believe I ever read any of the later entries in the series.