Slate: Daniel Valentine and Clarisse Lovelace #3 (Valentine & Lovelace)

Like the rest of this cracklingly witty, fast-paced series, Slate is set in an exuberantly pre-AIDS world, when to be young, attractive, and the owner of a successful gay bar was a dandy thing indeed. Clarisse has hauled her dainty posterior off to law school, Valentine has opened Boston's grooviest gay boite, Donna Summer is still on the radio, and there's a dead body at the disco: Life doesn't get a whole lot more fun. Boston's hottest new gay bar is making a killing in this mystery first published in 1984 that's "screamingly funny in the gayest way!" ( The New York Times ). Daniel Valentine is a gay bartender. Clarisse Lovelace is his straight pal. From Boston's gay underground to the fabulous beaches of Provincetown, they do everything together (well, okay, not everything ). And between it all, they still find time to solve a few murders. When Clarissa is gifted a run-down building by her gay uncle Noah, she and Daniel decide to make a dream come true: opening their own gay bar. While Clarissa heads off to law school, Daniel gets busy turning their new bar into Boston's grooviest gay boite. In this exuberantly pre-AIDS world, everything seems perfectly peachy#8212;until Daniel discovers a dead body at the disco In this third outing for Daniel Valentine and Clarisse Lovelace-denizens of Boston's gay subculture of the 80s-the duo decide to open a new gay bar in a run-down building gifted to them by Clarisse's uncle Noah