DROVER

Chicago Tribune columnist Granger gives his November Man thriller series a rest in order to write about a defrocked sportswriter investigating some mysteriously heavy betting against a heavily favored team. The hook for Jimmy Drover is the chance to take revenge on Slim Dingo, the loathsome gambler who drove Drover's ex- girlfriend's husband to suicide. Mobster Tony Rolls dangles the hook. Mr. Rolls will help Drover demolish Dingo if Drover will do something about the entrepreneurs at the Chicago Board of Trade- -their trading in sports-score futures may be about to cut into the mob's well-established preeminence in the sports gambling profession. Drover, still kind of sweet on Nancy Harrington, the new widow, takes the job and takes Slim Dingo for all the money he took from Nancy's late husband—and then he goes to work on the yuppie bookie business. He finds that the LaSalle Street money is betting against the powerful Denver Broncos for their upcoming game against the pitiful New Orleans Saints. Drover smells a setup that will take Lenny Gascon, the Broncos' superstud superstar quarterback, out of the game on a drug charge. Drover has to figure out not only who is doing the deed but how it will be done, since the monstrously narcissistic Gascon wouldn't dream of endangering his perfect body with an unnatural substance. A very, very angry Slim Dingo follows Drover's investigation with great interest. An almost impenetrably hard-boiled beginning turns into a more readable private-sports investigation with some nice moves.