Oh Ye Magical Beasts We Call Shapeshifters

There's a magic to animals, a purity of spirit that's captivating. They live to survive and procreate the species, and typically malice isn't in an animal's makeup.

So taking a beastly nature and inserting it into a human being makes for some fun stuff. You get the inner core needs of survival mixing with human goals, attributes, and untruths--perceptions as we see them.

I'm a huge fan of shifter stories for this reason. Taking the purity of the beast and shoving it into the chaos of man, then watching my creation adapt, overcome, and hopefully, fall in love.

My Circe's Recruits series takes the shapeshifter subgenre and turns that paranormal aspect on its side. Genetic manipulation, mating heats (and yes, I know mating heats have been done. I also started writing this series back in 2007), and a pack mating mentality all come together to make one tight, fierce family.

Circe's Recruits 2.0 are the new and improved Circs--shapeshifters. They look mostly human. They blend. And this time they're psychic as well. Fangs, claws, and a dire need to procreate make the Circs a pack that will move heaven and earth to protect their own.

The series unfolds in the next four months (Circe's Recruits 2.0: Gideon, is available now).

If you want something different, sexy, and wild, check out Circe's Recruits 2.0. And try to see the man within the beast...

CIRCE'S RECRUITS 2.0: ALEX

Coming Aug 22nd

Neither human nor animal, but something in between. And these Circs are hungry…

Excerpt:

Alex Palmer kept his face expressionless as he watched his client conduct business. He stood to the right of the slighter man, who was seated in a ratty, upholstered chair. Joo Kim wore a cheap black suit over a white collared shirt. Sweat beaded his forehead, the air conditioning nonexistent in the cheap hotel room.

The paper-thin walls allowed the chaos from the bustling Burmese province to bleed through. Shouts, horns, and street noise competed with the loud haggling from the prostitute and her john next door, the racket a mash of Burmese and English Alex partially understood but ignored, focused on keeping his client alive.

Joo Kim finished his deal, a fair trade of guns for drugs. The opium peddler, an older American man, had connections to a little known rebel faction in a small province outside the city. The seedy hotel was the perfect place for drug deals to go down with little fanfare. Small time dealers and buyers met often at the White Orchid.

But from their spot-on intel—nice job, Carter—Alex knew the hotel had recently begun attracting some important people with topnotch security. The American government also had an investment in the situation, since they kept an eye on the volatile region. Hence Alex’s client, Joo Kim, posing as a rogue CIA drug buyer.

Normally, the muscle of their private security firm would handle a case like this. Alex was a front man, the softer, more personable aspect of the business. The one who did the meet and greet with potential clients, putting them at ease while also showing them how impressive Gideon Enterprises was using an impressive show of fang and claw.

But he’d needed to be in on this one all the way because the buyer’s contact had insider information he wanted.

Information he needed.

The emptiness inside him, the loss that continued to plague him, echoed. Loneliness, his constant companion despite being surrounded by others, festered, and it drew on the rage he kept bottled up all the time. He couldn’t think about Katie without miring himself in a guilty fury.

Pain pricked at his fingertips as claws threatened to slide free. But he got a hold of his anger and kept the raging monster inside him from showing itself, used to pretending to be normal.

Hell, he’d been born with skills ordinary people considered fiction. But after being experimented on by some really bad people, Alex had become something else. Something not quite human.

To read more, click here. 

 

About the Author

Caffeine addict, boy referee, and romance aficionado, New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Marie Harte has over 100 books published with more constantly on the way. She’s a confessed bibliophile and devotee of action movies. Whether hiking in Central Oregon, biking around town, or hanging at the local tea shop, she’s constantly plotting to give everyone a happily ever after. Visit http://marieharte.com and fall in love.