The Gigolo Murder

August 17, 2009
Somer's second Turkish Delight mystery to be made available in the U.S. (after 2008's The Kiss Murder
) explores Istanbul's gay life and an alternative culture with sharp humor that avoids any hint of campiness. The series' normally feisty heroine, a nameless transvestite nightclub owner who dresses like Audrey Hepburn but also wears men's clothes for her day job, has become too depressed to even bathe as she nurses a broken heart. Dragged to a nightclub by Ponpon, a close friend and drag queen, she falls in lust with Haluk Perkedem, a handsome but married lawyer. When Haluk's brother-in-law is arrested for a well-known gigolo's murder, she and Ponpon plunge into their own investigation, becoming the Holmes and Watson of the transvestite set. A complex web of family honor, the nouveau riche and sexual politics is tailor-made for an amateur sleuth whose double life is anything but simple.