SHIFTING LOVE

Author: Constance O'Day-Flannery ISBN: 0765348896 11/2004 PARANORMAL Publisher: TOR

Maggie O'Shea knows that because of her dark past, there's no place for love in her life. She owns a successful store in Philadelphia, where she uses her special gifts to help the people she meets. Though this doesn't fulfill her, she is content. Most of the time. Entrepreneur Julian McDonald runs an empire. He's rich, cynical, bored-and not interested in relationships. He was in love, once, but since her death, there's been no space in his heart for anyone else. Maggie knows as soon as she meets Julian that she could fall in love with him. But a secret society devoted to bringing the world back into balance has a mysterious agenda for Julian-and doesn't care about the heart's wish of a vulnerable shapeshifter...

RRAH's THOUGHTS AND PONDERINGS:

Maggie O'Shea knows that because of her dark past, there's no place for love in her life. She owns a successful store in Philadelphia, where she uses her special gifts to help the people she meets. Though this doesn't fulfill her, she is content. Most of the time.

Entrepreneur Julian McDonald runs an empire. He's rich, cynical, bored—and not interested in relationships. He was in love, once, but since her death, there's been no space in his heart for anyone else.

Maggie knows as soon as she meets Julian that she could fall in love with him. But a secret society devoted to bringing the world back into balance has a mysterious agenda for Julian—and doesn't care about the heart's wish of a vulnerable shapeshifter...Very interesting. That is how I describe Constance O'Day-Flannery's SHIFTING LOVE. It's interesting because it's unique and fresh and you actually learn a little something, too. It's interesting because it makes you wonder about things that everyone accepts without question and enlightens you about people you may have dismissed with a casual glance before. It's interesting because it's almost the start of a spiritual awakening.

If you read this book, you should open your mind to the possibility that a story passed down for generations could be wrong. If you can accept that, then the rest of the story falls into place, beginning with the heroine Maggie O'Shea. Maggie seems so together and enlightened, so tuned into hope and love that it's a shock to the reader when she realizes she is doing exactly what she preaches to her clients not to do. Next you have our hero, Julian McDonald, Maggie's "assignment", who turns out to be really open to love, just not to the fact that the object of his affection can shape shift into any creature she wishes.

The wonderful thing about this story is the sudden bright moments or a-ha moments, that make you think. Make you wonder. Maggie and Julian's courtship is not what most of us will experience, but it's still warm and familiar. The storyline is complex and the characters even more so, making it something you ponder long after you finish it. Though billed as a paranormal, there is a lot more to this story than a simple thing like changing your shape.

Shannon Johnson