The novel was written in 1980 and is called "Sisters"
Here is a knee jerk excerpt just for my conservative friends

Whatever the reason, she felt detached, almost as though she were floating, and for a moment she imagined herself in another age. She was an onlooker to a medieval mystery play, credulous, eager to grant mythic qualities to the mortals before her. The women who embraced in the wagon were Adam and Eve crossing a dark cathedral stage--no, Eve and Eve, loving one another as they would not be able to once they ate of the fruit and knew themselves as they truly were. She felt curiously moved, curiously envious of them. She had never to this moment thought Eden a particularly attractive paradise, based as it was on naivete, but she saw that the women in the cart had a passionate, loving intimacy forever closed to her. How strong it made them. What comfort it gave.

You can find it all here  www.livejournal.com/users/lynnecheney/

Ummmm... what is this?  No comment on the 2nd ladies prose that can be construed as sympathetic to lesbian intimacy?