February 2, 1975

This is not an easy novel to describe. It is something like the movie “BlowUp,” let us say, in that its hero thinks he spies with a camera what his naked eyes have refused to see. And it is something like the novels of RobbeGrillet in that its prose is deadpan, toneless, under a spell, looped in its own obsessions, words whispering inside the head of a madman. It is like Pynchon's “Gravity's Rainbow” in that its symbolic and allusive formulae come from science and technology rather than from literature and other art, and in that one reads through it as one might move through sets designed by a secretive and paranoid demiurge. It is like many novels written by authors from Dostoevsky to Michel Butor in that its unexpected harmonies and novel dissonances sound against the conventions of the mystery novel. It is like the recent work of Norman Mailer in its hero's attempt to sniff out and soak up the power, energy, magic or mana released by violence and fear. “We are in the grip of forces,” says Cartwright, the hero whose mind is the “lookout cartridge” of the title, "and also of their absence."

With high costs and consumer caution clouding the home‐buying market, Americans are expected to spend between $25‐billion and $30‐billion this year on home remodeling.

Questions and answers on Pres Ford's program for curbing oil and gas consumption through higher energy taxes (M)

NY Times inquiry into testimony of CIA official Howard J Osborne about initial CIA reaction to Watergate finds that number of high‐level CIA officials, including former CIA dir Richard Helms, and Dir of Central Intelligence William E Colby were informed on June 19, ‘72, that transcript of internal CIA tape recording showed that Ehrlichman had authorized agency in ‘71 to begin its support activities on behalf of E Howard Hunt, who was then member of plumbers unit investigating Daniel Ellsberg (S)

Black people in US are gaining more visibility on TV because of civil rights movements of 60s and formation of black pressure groups; TV entertainment has expanded to include black characters and themes and new black visibility can be most noticeably traced to situation comedy programs; 3 series built around black characters are Sanford and Son, The Jeffersons and Good Times; illus of Jimmie Walker from show Good Times (L)