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Review

Geoffrey Knight's The Curse of the Dragon God, from Cleis Press, features a team of hot, gay adventurers who could hold their own with James Bond, Indiana Jones, or any other action hero. Hailing from various countries and led by the dapper Professor Fathom, these globe-trotting guys come to the aid of Zhang Sen, a wealthy Chinese businessman with a penchant for diamonds. Someone has been stealing Zhang's precious stones, trading them on the black market for weapons, and Zhang fears that the next heist will target his most prized possession, a massive diamond known as the Eye of Fucanglong.

Legend has it that the Eye was cursed almost two thousand years ago, after a witch snatched it from the chest of a man who did not return her love and lost it in a battle with a vengeful dragon god. Over the centuries, those who looked at the Eye suffered bloody deaths, and whole empires fell into ruin. You'd think that, with such an unfortunate history, the Eye would be the last diamond anyone would want to steal.

Not so. Acrobatic, gun-toting thieves crash a party at Zhang's Diamond Tower, taking not only the Eye, but Zhang and Professor Fathom as well. Fathom's team of sexy young adventurers gather from around the globe, determined to track the thieves down, retrieve the diamond and free the captured men. That's as much as I will say about the plot. The book reads in much the same way an action movie unfolds on the screen. There are car chases. Bullets and fists fly. Ships crash. Dinner plates are turned into deadly weapons. In between all that action, the guys squeeze in some wonderful sexcapades.

I loved every bit of it. You don't get much in the way of character development, and a few of Knight's descriptions are a little repetitive. But the scene where a sword swallower puts his talents to use on one of Fathom's men is, in itself, enough to atone for such lapses.

 -- Gilbert Williams