Darkness Descending

Politics, gender identity, religion--and hatred--intersect and collide in this fourth Mimi Patterson/Gianna Maglione mystery, and the hatred doesn't come from just outside the vulnerable gay and lesbian community, though there is more than enough of that to go around. This time it seems that splinter religious and police groups have joined forces to make life hellish for the women who frequent two bars/night clubs in a couple of rough DC neighborhoods. To make matters worse, Police Lieutenant Gianna Maglione's Hate Crimes Unit knew nothing of these establishments until a murder and rape introduce them to her. Women who should have felt safe under the protection the HCU instead became victims and Gianna is equal part guilty and angry. As Gianna rushes to correct her error, Mimi delves into the corruption in the places that should be safe havens for all--the church and the police department--and finds herself a target. And for the first time, Mimi and Gianna join forces to expose corrupt cops who hide behind equally corrupt preachers who hide behind scripture to justify their hatred of homosexuals. But another problem for the crime-busting women is a huge thing that is not a crime at all but which could prove to be just as devastating: The hatred within the community of gay women for some of their own, women who identify as Doms and Ags, mostly young Blacks and Latinas who appear super-masculine in dress and sometimes in behavior and who are "distasteful" and threatening to their mainstream sisters. This is new knowledge for Mimi and Gianna, and it calls upon them to investigate their own feelings and beliefs based not on the law but on what is right and wrong.