Jackson Square Jazz — Greg Herren

Greg Herren's Bourbon Street Blues, featuring Scotty Bradley--stripper, P.I., psychic, and droll commentator on gay life (his own and everyone else's)--hit a chord with readers everywhere. Now, the buff, blond ex-go-go boy is back, embroiled with a few good men and a murder case that is turning the Big Easy into anything but.

Doing something, anything, everything could be Scotty Bradley's M.O. He's certainly no saint, but when you live in the equivalent of the gay man's candy store, it's a bit hard to be monogamous. Unfortunately, his straight-arrow, FBI agent, sort-of boyfriend Frank has other ideas--deep, committed love ideas that are turning Scott's Hot Daddy into a decidedly less-than-sizzling puppy dog. It's enough to send a guy into full-fledged slut mode, and that's how Scotty ends up nursing a massive hangover in a hotel room with cutie pie Bryce Bell--he of the rounded backside and sheepish grin. As if that weren't enough, Bryce turns out to be the hottest young skater in the U.S. He's also hiding a secret bigger than his Joe Boxers.

Always up for a good time, Scotty is thrilled to get a sly invitation and Bryce's hotel key card delivered via a Skate America usher. But what he finds when he arrives there isn't the gay blade himself but a dead body, stabbed through the heart. Suddenly, Scotty is thrust into Bryce's other life and his connection to an unsolved crime that has haunted the New Orleans police for years--the theft of a priceless artifact stolen from the celebrated Cabildo museum as it burned to the ground. He's also drawn back into the arms of Colin, the world's sexiest cat burglar, who has a lot of light to shed on the Cabildo fire (while also shedding clothes) and the trail of murder at its heart. Still, there's something not right about this case, something hidden and potentially devastating. Scotty can feel it through his tarot readings and his increasingly terrifying visions. He can sense it in the dark green car that follows him along Louisiana's moonlit roads and the shadows that seem to leap out at him around every corner of the French Quarter. Something about the case snakes from Bryce's twisted family secrets through an artifact worth killing for and right into an incident from Scotty's own past. Danger may not be his middle name, but it is coming, and this time, it's coming for him.

As refreshing as an ice-cold bottle of Jax beer, as sexy as the sultry bars and smoky jazz clubs of New Orleans, Jackson Square Jazz is another wonderful, strange trip down south in the company of the most deliciously decadent P.I. ever to wear a thong--and be proud of it.