She Came to the Castro

For lesbian San Francisco PI Emma Victor (She Came by the Book, 1996), a textbook case of political blackmail leads to a rather preposterous global conspiracy involving, according to a Secret Service agent who confides in Emma, ""the forces of fascism."" Emma is hired to make two payment drops in exchange for a video of progressive mayoral candidate Margo Villanueva caught in flagrante delicto. The successful first drop yields valuable clues, but the second is disastrous: Emma finds the seller dead (shot at close range) and ends up in a gunfight, during which both the video and the cash vanish. As Emma's other case, which involves locating Kimilar Jones's ex-boyfriend and getting him to sign a quitclaim to Kimilar's New Mexico goat farm, takes a similar dive, Villanueva's chief aide demonstrates a personal dislike of the PI. When the two cases converge at the Gay and Lesbian Film Festival, lives are threatened, there is a stampede and Emma's risky antics add to the legends of supernatural phenomena at the Castro Theatre. The tale barrels along amicably, and Wings's light touch is refreshingDexcept for occasional turns toward comic-book hysteria, as when she suggests that Timothy McVeigh was part of a conspiracy that includes the American religious right, ""German industrialists manipulating Shiite Muslims... and certain elements that have taken hold in the Vatican."" (Apr.)