Don Strachey
Created by Richard Stevenson (pseud. of Richard Lipez)

Albany, New York private peeper DON STRACHEY is openly gay, a younger (forty-something) more emotional, and slightly flaky persona compared to Joseph Hansen's middle-aged, controlled Dave Brandstetter. Where Dave is calm and collected, Don is flippant, sassy, sloppy, paranoid, compulsive, impulsive and prone to plots and plans. And sometimes just plain screwy. In other words, not particularly well-adjusted.

But he is loyal to his friends, and he's not an all-together failure as a private eye. Aiding him in his cases are his live-in lover, and sometime-conscience, Timothy J. Callahan, a Jesuit-trained attorney for the state government, and later an legislative aide for a New York senator, plus various friends and acquaintances in Albany's large gay network.

Don also receives some rather reluctant help from gruff, conservative, homophobic and not-quite-the-sharpest-knife-in-the-drawer Detective Lieutenant Ned Bowman of the Albany Police, "a man in love with the obvious," according to Don. "Homosexuals not wearing pleated skirts always confused Bowman."

What there is no confusion about is the quality of this series. Stevenson is simply one hell of a writer, and fans of detective fiction who shy away from this series solely because of the gay content are doing themselves a disservice.

As a friend of mine once opined, "I'm not even gay -- not that there's anything wrong with that -- but I think these are some of the funniest, smartest PI novels around. The guy is just a terrific writer! Maybe even brilliant."

There have also been a couple of made-for-television films released, Third Man Out (2005) and Shock to the System (2006), starring hunky Chad Allan as Strachey, for the Here! network ("Gay television. No apologies."). Although low-budget, with British Columbia standing in for Albany, both have received generally good reviews, prompting The New York Times to tag the latter "a sly, refreshingly grown-up gay entertainmen." and Out Magazine to proclaim "Chad Allan "Hotter than Columbo. Way, way hotter."

And you've got to just love when here! refers to Morgan Fairchild, who co-stars in the second flick, as the "television diva and icon,."

Author Richard Stevenson also reviews crime fiction for The Washington Post under the byline of Richard Lipez.

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Report respectfully submitted by Kevin Burton Smith.

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