THE GLORY HOLE MURDERS

H.R. Loomis, a personable young New Orleans businessman with a blue-blooded wife and a lovely daughter, has been found gruesomely murdered in the bathroom of a gay bar. But narcissistic Matt Sinclair, the preening narrator of this uneven mystery debut, isn't much interested: ""I ceased to patronize the hangouts and bathhouses somewhere between herpes and AIDS. . . So when some closet queen turns up seriously dead with his dick pinned through a hole in a toilet wall, I can hardly identify with his problem."" Still, pressured by the local cops, Matt--formerly with the DA's office, now a chic antique dealer--agrees to do some sleuthing. And he soon learns that the murder-victim, a ""great guy"" to acquaintances, was a horror to his intimates: an ""omnisexual"" who abused women, men, even his own daughter. Meanwhile, however, other victims--including a gay-bar owner and ""the dirtiest fag baiter on the New Orleans vice squad""--continue to be gorily dispatched in bar toilets. So Matt, when not being seduced or attacked by a variety of sexual partners, wonders if all the murders are truly connected. . .or not. The plotting is tangled and arbitrary. Matt's smug narration, straining for wittiness, constantly slides over into Miss Piggy patois and mere camp. (His idea of smashing repartee is along the lines of ""Are you out of your cunt?"") So, while there's enough humor and atmosphere here to suggest that Fennelly has some potential, readers looking for gay-accented mystery/ comedy will want to stick with Nathan Aldyne.