April Without Fear

ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUTTHE IRS TO BEAT THEMAT THE GAMES THEY PLAY

by Paul N. Strassels, with Robert Wool '55Random, 1980. 229 pp. $10.95

It's about time. At last, a variation on the ever-popular expose, kiss-and-tell genre that is useful: EX-IRS TAX EXPERT TELLS ALL: "what happens to your return, who gets audited and why, how you can fight back and live without fear." Strassels' thesis: it's total war all the way. He personalizes it. Your fictive name in the book is t/p (for taxpayer), your accountant's is Marvin. It's you and Marvin, the two of you, against the redoubtable, devious Harry the Auditor (with his 69,999 IRS colleagues in reserve). Know your enemy; it's your only effective weapon. And so, says Strassels, "I want to take you inside, where I was," to expose IRS's strategy by "showing you who Harry the Auditor really is, what his training is, how his tax mind is shaped."

As you and Strassels and maybe Marvin "look over Harry's shoulder as he reviews your return and prepares his strategy to audit you, you ought to get some practical insight on how to cope with Harry.... I hope you are finally able to shake that nameless fear of the unknown. That you are able to regard the IRS clearly, even cooly.... At that point you are finally taking charge of your tax life." Former political editor of the New York TimesMagazine, Wool heads "the New York book- packaging company that produced this book." It could all hardly be more timely.