2.  Detective:  Laurie King, Nightwork.,  New York:  Bantam 2000.

One of King’s Kate Martinelli series, this lesbian detective is drawn into an investigation into murders within an Indian community, specifically a young Indian woman who may have been murdered for not producing a male child.  In the course of her investigation, Kate encounters a female Episcopal priest (Roz) who is also conversant with Kali traditions.  The following is an excerpt showing Kate’s first encounter with Kali:

For a brief but intense moment, Kate thought that she was being attacked by a wild woman with blood on her teeth. She could almost smell the blood, splashed around the woman in a pool, and then the hallucination faded, leaving her to gaze in mingled amazement and horror at the image before her.
     The painting on the wall was enough to give a man nightmares. It showed a woman of sorts, but this was a woman who would have caused a playboy to shrivel, would have given pause to the most ardent feminist, would have a Freudian rapidly retracting that plaintive, worn, masculine query concerning what women wanted.
     For what this lady wanted was blood.
     And had it, as Kate could well see. The deep blue, larger-than-life female was wading through a lake of the stuff, splashing it around, looking drunk with it. Kate recognized her instantly as Kali with the necklace of skulls and the belt of human hands, laughing her terrible pleasure at the decapitated head she held up in one of her four arms.