than fiction will sell
better in a market already jaded by exotic overexposure."

Demaris' book on Hoover can only be called sympathetic. This is
immediately indicated by his choice of interviewees. They include
high level FBI administrators like Robert E. Wick, John P. Mohr,
and Mark Felt; former Attorney General Richard Kleindienst;
Hoover publicity flack Louis Nichols who named one of his sons
after his boss; and actor Efrem Zimbalist who starred in ABC's
glamorized series on the Bureau. In the entire book, there are
eight pages on Hoover's infamous COINTELPRO operations, i.e. the
infiltration, disruption, and occasional destruction of domestic
political movements.

In Hoover's disputes with the Kennedys, there can be no doubt
where Demaris stands. Speaking of Hoover's reputed blackmailing
of presidents, he writes: "It is possible that one or two were
intimidated by their own guilty conscience...." He sums up Hoover
by saying, "He was, whatever his failings, an extraordinary man,
truly one of a kind." The above gives