Sandy M’s review of The Changing Season (Shifting Circle, Book 3) by Sharon Shinn
Paranormal Romance published by Ace 4 Nov 14

This Shifting Circle series from Sharon Shinn still continues to intrigue me. While we get to see the everyday goings-on of a shape-changer, along with their shifting lives and how they handle it all, we also get twists and turns that you never see coming. I also really like the connections, subtle as they may be, between characters so far from book to book.

Karadel has taken over the role of “vet” to take care of the shape-shifters who visit her isolated place, those injured or just in need of a safe place for a night. It was Janet, who we met in Still Life with Shape-Shifter, who originally helped their kind in need, all with the help of Karadel’s father, who made sure his daughter had a place to shift and be safe at the same time. See, Karadel doesn’t just shift into a wolf or a bear or any other animal we normally see in shifter stories. She shifts into whatever her body has a mind to, including an elephant at one time. Imagine what havoc that would cause if she were in public. In contrast, a wolf running about doesn’t seem it would attract much notice.

In this book I also get some answers to questions I was left with when I finished SLwSS. Usually I’m not all that fired up when it comes to being left hanging at the end of a book, but this time I wanted to know what happened to Janet and her shifter boyfriend, Cooper. Though we don’t live through that part of the story in this book, we get a first-hand account from Karadel. She’s also continued Janet’s work in trying to find a way to inhibit their shifting, either in duration or type of animal. Kara has been somewhat successful for herself and a friend, Ryan, who is a former lover.

We get to meet Karadel’s circle of friends, some shifters and some not, but all who keep the shape-shifters’ secret and help out when they’re caught in the wrong place at the wrong time when they change. On a night out with a friend, Celeste, Karadel meets Joe. He’s all human, charming and fun, and Kara would like to get to know him better, but her hesitation is for obvious reasons. But Joe is smitten from the beginning, and he makes sure he sees her again, even after the fracas Celeste kicks up when she hooks up with the wrong guy at the bar that night. Thus begins a string of unpredictable events that lead to a tragic and surprising ending.

Joe eventually learns about the shifters’ secret in an unfortunate way involving Alfonso, a young, abused boy who has been adopted by Kara’s lesbian friends, Bonnie and Aurelia. A former big-city cop, Joe takes the incredible idea of people shifting into animals, something he sees with his own eyes, in stride. Of course, it has more to do with his feelings for Kara than anything else, even as he comes to care bit by bit for her friends. I like his patience with Karadel as their relationship grows, knowing she’s skittish when it comes to her alter nature. He’s solid as a rock, though; someone you need in a life like hers.

Though I would never get tired of more shifting going on in the story, there’s plenty to keep the pace moving along. Each shifter has a few weeks in human form before changing takes place, so you follow them through their daily routines, which is really rather fascinating only because they never know when they’ll be foraging in the woods or waiting for a friend to drop by to give them a bowl of milk. Kara has to think fast when her change comes upon her in the middle of her first date with Joe. There’s a number of these fun instances to keep a smile on the reader’s face. And I really enjoyed the twist out of nowhere during the intensity of the last quarter of the book. Definitely didn’t see that coming at all.

I’m much more intrigued than ever with this series. I hope there’s more planned for the future.

Grade: A

Summary:

For Karadel, being a shape-shifter has always been a reality she couldn’t escape. Even though she’s built a safe life as a rural veterinarian, with a close-knit network of shifter and human friends who would do anything for her—and for each other—she can’t help but wish for a chance at being normal.

When she’s not dealing with her shifts or caring for her animal patients, she attempts to develop a drug that will help shifters control their changes—a drug that might even allow them to remain human forever.

But her comfortable life is threatened by two events: She meets an ordinary man who touches her heart, and her best friend is forced to shift publicly with deadly consequences.

Now Karadel must decide whom to trust: her old friends or her new love.

No excerpt available.

Other books in this series: