Fishing for corpses

Well, back when I posted about another book by Mark Richard Zubro, I mentioned that I had 3 books by him checked out. One ended up having no renewals left, but I figured out I'd read it a while back. The other, Hook, Line & Homicide, I figured out that I don't remember reading at all. And since it isn't due back for another week, I read it.

Paul Turner, his sons Brian and Jeff, his lover Ben,  his former lover Ian, and his detective partner Fenwick and family, all go on a fishing trip in rural Canada. (Also in tow is nonagenarian neighbor, Mrs. Talucci, who leaves by boat to parts unknown for the duration of the trip.)

Anyway, Paul and Fenwick end up meeting Scarth Krohn, the local town bully while out for dinner. Scarth at the time is busy harassing the local First Americans in the restaurant parking lot. After Paul and Fenwick break up the fight, they become targets of Scarth and company's bullying, including a break in at their houseboat back in the marina.

Two days later, Paul's wheelchair bound son Jeff fishes Scarth's corpse out of the lake next to the houseboat.

Ian, the intrepid investigative reporter, starts digging around for clues, after finding out that 6 similar suspicious drownings have occurred on the lake, and interest is up in town, since Scarth's very affluent father is demanding an investigation. The local police chief is exceptionally racist and homophobic, and the local Ontario Provincial Police detachment is reluctant to do much because of the chief trying to get them removed from town. Said chief "rounds up the usual suspects (Billing Morningsky, the First Nations kid being harrassed earlier; Ralph, a kid who spent his youth being harassed by Scarth; and even Ian, who's been asking questions around town) and warns Paul and Fenwick not to investigate.

Needless to say, this provides impetus for the dynamic duo to get involved on the side, which tends to make the town seem like a an isolated Lovecraftian village well versed at hiding secrets. Mind you, the secrets are more drug dealing and internet porn than ancient gods from outside time and space, but....

Anyway, by the end we find out exactly what happened, and we know why Scarth died and why Scarth's on again off again girlfriend was foud beaten to death not far from where Scarth's body probably entered the lake. As well as a lesson on why gay folks should take self defense.

Really, the part that both amazed and amused me came towards the end when things like DOMA, the marriage bans, and even Matthew Shepherd get discussed. The publication date on this one is 2007, so it's nice to note that much has changes in a relatively short amount of time. In many ways, it's a bit like reading the middle three books in Tales of the City, wherein what was current at the time of the writing isn't so much anymore. While the issues might remain, they're no longer quite as immediate or as strongly opposed as they were at the time.

I'm kind of wondering if, had either of Zubro's series gone on a few more years, would the main characters have gotten involved with murder at their gay weddings?

Dirty Pop

So, technically, I read Mark Richard Zubro's Dead Egotistical Morons back in 2003 when it came out, but I wasn't running this blog back then.

Also, I remain surprised this particular book didn't get more press with its overall plot line.

Paul Turned is a Chicago detective, who, along with his partner Fenwick, gets called out to Chicago's All-Sports Arena where Roger Stendar, one of the 5 singers of Boys4U has been found shot execution style in the showers following the final show.  What follows is a very soapy murder mystery that roughly corresponds to what would happen if N*SYNC revealed a bunch of information about how they'd all been... involved... with each other, with their producer, with their choreographer...

Really, it's a lot more over the top than I remember. The main reason it stuck out in my mind was the Lance Bass character actually being gay. (In 2003, the real Lance wasn't quite the gay superstar he is in 2015.)  Zubro wrote quite a few of the Paul Turner mysteries, as well as the Tom & Scott mysteries, which were also fun and soapy. (One was a teacher, the other a baseball player.) Only real issue I ever had with them was the continuity between books was always quite a bit off, as if the timeline got thrown out the window every time someone gets killed.

Anyway, reading gay mysteries again got me thinking about how mysteries were one of the few big genres I could reliably find gay materials in when visiting a bookstore. (This is not to say that they didn't exist, but much of it was pulpy romance, or not in a genre I really wanted to start getting involved with (Sadly, Sci-Fi and fantasy are really underrepresented in books with gay protagonists. A few exist, but even then, if you manage to get a gay character, it's essentially the gay bff.)

So, with that in mind, I went digging through amazon trying to remember some of the authors and series that used to captivate me when I could afford to go book shopping.

Nathan Aldyne wrote a series that started with Vermillion, that took place in pre-HIV Boston/Provincetown. Mostly I remember the first murder involving someone getting a Prince Albert and really bot enjoying what happened after. (Loved the book, but yeah, lots of crossed legs.)

David Stukas wrote a series of books that started with Someone Killed his Boyfriend. Very silly, very CAMPY, but also fun to read.

RD Zimmerman wrote the Todd Mills Mysteries. These started with Closet, which was fairly campy, then went really serious really quickly. It was probably the first time I really started encountering the anger about how People with HIV/AIDS were being treated in regular fiction.

I can't find the gay espionage mystery series I used to love to read, so if anyone remembers, let me know.

There's also the classic Mabel Maney A Ghost in the Closet, which was 3rd in a series parodying Nancy Drew. This book introduced The Hardly Boys, and had Nurse Cherry Aimless, whom Nancy Clue was sort of in love with.

As I've mentioned previously, I'm quite ecstatic that gay lit has expanded beyond the borders I found when I came out in the 90's. Mind you, they still mostly concern gay folks who are a lot higher on the social ladder than I am, but then I doubt books concerning gay men in their late 30's working retail would sell particularly well.

As a note, I have 2 other Zubro mysteries in the TBR shelf, so you may see a few more showing up on here over time.