Fletch Won

Fletch has been with the News-Tribune for 3 months, is engaged to be married on Saturday, is supposed to meet his future mother-in-law at dinner, and has just been given the uninteresting job of interviewing an oily lawyer who is giving $5 million to the museum.  Of course, being Fletch, everything goes awry.  The lawyer is found dead in the newspaper parking lot.  Fletch views this as great news, since his story is now a murder case.  Nope.  Biff Wilson of the crime beat will take over.  He is sent to investigate an escort agency, something that he is less than keen to discuss with his fiancée.  Worse, there is a notorious robber who bears a striking resemblance to Fletch, causing him repeated problems.  Despite being pulled from the murder story, Fletch investigates, much to the irritation of his editor and Biff.

Chronologically the first book in the series, it is the 8th to be written.  In the previous novels, it had been revealed that Fletch was twice divorced, graduated from Northwestern University, worked as a reporter in Chicago, and had earned a Bronze Star while serving in the Marine Corps in southeast Asia (presumably Vietnam).  Here, he comes off as a fellow on his first newspaper job, stuck doing menial tasks and not having a desk to himself.  There are some funny hints at the future, such as when the society page editor mentions the Stanwyks (cf. Fletch) or he mentions his interest in art (cf. Confess, Fletch).

There is a bit too much slapstick and frequently surpassing the suspension of disbelief.  When Fletch is being throttled in the editor's office, I could only picture Homer throttling Bart in The Simpsons.  The police chase was just ludicrous.  Also, Fletch is getting married at the end of the week but has no chemistry with his fiancée.  The reader already knows they are getting divorced, so why bother working on any attraction between them beyond some sex scenes?  After his convincing affairs with Moxie, one expects some sparks with his first wife.

As for the mysteries, they are hardly worthy of note.  The book drags out the discovery of the murderer, which required almost no deductive reasoning at all.  As for the escort agency, Fletch largely outsourced that.  Sure, that's good work, but it was someone else's work.  Unimpressive on both counts.

Overall, disappointing.