It's the last week of December, a brooding time of year even for a hip, sardonic, New York cowboy/private-eye. When an ex-Texas Jewboys guitarist comes to crash, Kinky's gloom turns to horror: his 'housepest' gets savagely murdered in the shower, his loft gets pumped full of lethal gas, a dismembered doll shows up in the mail, and deadly accidents start befalling other members of the guerilla country-music band. Someone is killing the Jewboys of Texas. Kinky stalks the killer, armed only with an attitude and a cigar, aided and obstructed by a now-familiar crew: Winnie, the lesbian dance teacher; Cleve, the flipped-out ex-manager of the Lone Star; Dylan, who speaks in song lyrics; McGovern, the herculean journalist; and Ratso, his raffish Watson.