Books: Round & Round She Goes

THE TRUMAN MERRY-GO-ROUND (502 pp.)—Roberf S. Allen & William V. Shannon—Vanguard ($3.50).

In 1931, Reporters Drew Pearson and Robert S. Allen whirled to journalistic fame on the Washington Merry-Go-Round. The book, and its continuation in a daily column of the same title, told the backstairs story of Washington politics with all the urgency of a cloakroom whisper, and the crusading fervor of a revival meeting.

With 20 years of hard riding, most of the political animals on the original Merry-Go-Round have worn out or fallen off. The Truman Merry-Go-Round gives the once-over, not very lightly, to their replacements. Despite a substitution on the...