Author Michael Luongo recently published two queer-themed books: “The Voyeur,” a novel about a gay sex researcher, and “Gay Travels in the Muslim World,” a collection of travel essays he edited. Both have their merits and their drawbacks.

“Gay Travels in the Muslim World” is an exciting, provocative anthology that negotiates queer sexuality in Arab countries. The 18 stories reveal the contradictions men who love men face in their homelands, where homosexuality is forbidden. Various entries explore Americans romancing men from the Arab world — such as Jeff Key’s brief story “Lance Corporal Key’s Middle East Vacation,” about his experiences as a Marine sharing a sexy moment with a gay Iraqi, or Jay Davidson’s “It All Began with Mamadou,” which recounts his same-sex loving in Mauritania as a Peace Corps volunteer.

Yet the best entries in this very strong collection compare and contrast the similarities between two different, often enemy, groups. Parvez Sharma’s “Work in Progress” includes observations that George Bush “has much in common with the mullahs that preach intolerance” — bolstered by the author’s terrific, impassioned plea that ends his piece. Equally powerful is the tension that mounts in David C. Muller’s “The Galilee,” between a gay Israeli Arab and a gay Israeli as they cruise each other. Both teens are uncertain if they are about to fuck or fight.

“Gay Travels in the Muslim World” notes the irony that men in the Muslim world can touch or hold hands freely as part of their culture, but that being gay is taboo. The despair Thomas Bradbury expresses in “Paradox” when he discovers his Turkish lover — who insists that he is not gay — is married is palpable, if predictable.

While there are many positive stories of men finding a common bond sating their sexual desires, there are also cautionary tales about robbery and rape and the dangers of being gay in the Arab world. There are several references to the “Cairo 52” — the gay men arrested for being on the “Queen Boat” floating nightclub.

If Luongo himself eloquently describes the conflicted space of men who want to be sexual in his entry “Adventures in Afghanistan,” in which all intimate activity stops when he shows his penis to a group of men, his anthology makes its greatest misstep in his preface, which hopscotches all over the place trying to contextualize homosexuality in the Muslim world — surely an impossible task. Yet Luongo succeeds in pulling together the voices in this outstanding collection.

“The Voyeur” of the title of Luongo’s novel is Jason, a 27-year-old gay man getting his Ph.D. and working for a sex research project in New York. He is assigned the task of passing out cards to men who frequent cruising areas such as bathhouses, porn theaters and even the Rambles in Central Park, encouraging the men to discuss their sexual practices and disclose their HIV status. Despite the slightly misleading title — which is explained in the book’s final chapters — this work is Jason’s “dream job,” an opportunity to connect with gay men and discuss their sexual practices.

As such, “The Voyeur” may disappoint readers expecting the book to catalogue Jason witnessing a series of explicit sexual encounters. While there are a few steamy episodes, to Luongo’s credit, the book is salacious without being overtly so. The vivid descriptions of various dens of iniquity are rendered with as much detail about the atmosphere as what actually takes place at each venue.

This is not to say Luongo is a prude; Jason is saved from an attack by wielding a wooden penis, and there is considerable — and often educational — talk about sex toys, safe sex practices and plastic vaginas.

But the heart of the novel is about how Jason’s sex research affects him and his interpersonal relationships. For example, Jason’s boyfriend Mark wants more action and less research, and this causes a rift between them that comes to a head when Jason learns Mark has been cheating on him. In addition, Jason’s mother is offended by her son’s candor about his work and sex life and yet Jason delights in shocking her.

“The Voyeur” depicts how Jason reconciles his work with his friends, family and colleagues, but it takes a very didactic approach. Too much of the story seems to create drama out of disclosures — Mark revealing that he is HIV-positive or Jason confessing to anyone who will listen about his sexual hang-ups. The result is a novel that is all about sex, but without the joy of it.

This is, most likely, Luongo’s point, and while Jason repeats the importance of his work as “saving lives,” he does take his work a bit too seriously. In contrast, the novel’s best and most interesting character is Jason’s co-worker Ricky, a sexy and sassy Dominican who is all too eager to violate research protocol in the name of having a good time.

Some readers will wish that Ricky’s story comprised the heart of “The Voyeur.”