A Queer Kind of Umbrella

A messy, inane plot and lame attempts at humor sink the latest in Baxt's series starring gay, black NYPD detective Pharaoh Love. A Chinatown gang boss feuds with his wife, his underlings and his silent partner, a Greek shipping heiress, while trying to fend off the feds and the cops. Pharaoh infiltrates the operation, adventuring from China to Far Rockaway to various undifferentiated spots in the Big Apple. Baxt reaches for one-liners here, but most fall short: a mansion is filled with pictures of ``old masters and old mistresses''; after a freighter full of illegal aliens runs aground, one cop says, ""`Look at the bodies floating face downward! They're dead!' `Or disinterested,' "" responds another. Pharaoh insists he's fighting homophobia, but he seems all flamboyant clothes and gratuitous campiness (""`Oh God, I can't be preggers again!'"") and remains a hollow figure. There's little to recommend here. (Sept.)