Ice Blues

Don Strachey is the gay private eye who scored a hit in Stevenson's thriller, On the Other Hand, Death. A case of murder keeps Strachey and his lover, Timmy Callahan, at home in Albany during a fierce winter because the victim was planted in the detective's car. The dead man, Jack Lenihan, had left a letter in which he asked Strachey to deliver 2.5 million in laundered money to the city's reform political party. But the money has vanished, sending Strachey on a dangerous errand to recover it from merciless killers. Suspecting that Lenihan had stolen the fortune from the drug dealers who were his former associates, Strachey flies to Los Angeles to question Lenihan's mother and friends, a mission with stunning results. Back in Albany, the detective hijacks the millions but the thieves kidnap and hold Timmy for ransom, a situation Strachey resolves in an act daring to the point of foolhardiness. This scene, as well as the disposition of Lenihan's legacy, form the climax of an entirely unpredictable, witty and raunchy adventure. (March 31)