Rating: 4.25⭐️
S.E. Babin is an author I’ve read before with mixed feelings. Some series I’ve really connected with and others not so much.
Shift of Heart, the first in Babin’s Shifter Lords paranormal romance series, is one I’m excited about and currently enjoying.
The description of this book drew me in but, now headed to the next book in the series, I feel that it’s a bit misleading. And needs clarification to begin with on an element that should come with trigger warnings.
Here’s the lead in.
“In-hiding hedgewitch florist by day. Powerful demigoddess by blood. Shapeshifting immortal by accident.”
That last bit? No accident but a horrifying assault, vividly captured, and for some, as it’s a reoccurring part of the story and a traumatic experience for the character, a element I think should have a trigger warning. Assault and potentially death. FYI.
Onto the other aspects of Shift of Heart. The world building is one that’s being assembled as part of the process of storytelling. So we don’t know how humans and nonhumans cohabitate separately as well as they do. Especially as humans aren’t supposed to know about the paranormal beings. And readers just get an understanding of otherworldly politics and governance as events happen.
It’s a characters that make the story. Especially the found family that exists around the main character of Evie Quinn, a Flouromage who runs a flower shop with her best friends, a vampire, a banshee, and a dryad. With a main goal of being successful while trying to stay hidden from the horrors she’s fled from. As well as her Mother.
The best friends, are beautifully crafted. Each one has a unique personality as well as fascinating otherworldly qualities due to their species and history. And they’re all very close to Evie. They know her secrets, her past.
For me they are fantastic and support the story even when I feel that the author has Evie being self destructive and close to a TSTL character.
Most of that is due to her involvement and interactions with the Alpha of all Shifters in her area. Toxic relationship is how most people would describe it.
Although it’s a staple of some romance tropes. Outlooks are changing.
The Alpha is all “everything/everyone is mine” rawr! If I don’t like it or get it. Let’s destroy it. So of course, things around Evie are destroyed.
He fixes it. She tries to or pays for it. Pattern says that it continues.
To be fair. Caelan, the Alpha, recognizes that there is a problem with his approach. And her friends and a mentor are the ones who will tell Evie that she’s jeopardizing herself and them in this situation.
But it’s that relationship and story so it’s going to continue on this path. If you find it as frustrating as I did be warned.
What is worth continuing forward is the multiple mysteries, the mythology and the interwoven relationships between the gods, current events and the characters. That’s intriguing and suspenseful.
And it’s got me fully engaged in the series and process, and this group of characters.
Check it out! Especially if urban fantasy or paranormal romance is your thing.
Cover design by Covers by Christian
Shifter Lords :
Shift of Heart #1
Shift of Morals #2
Power Shift #3 – Oct 26,2025
Shifting Winds #4 – Feb 10,2026
Shifting Resolve #5 – March 31,2026
Shift of Rule #6 – May 26,2026
Shift of the Wild #7 – July 28,2026
Buy link
Blurb
In-hiding hedgewitch florist by day. Powerful demigoddess by blood. Shapeshifting immortal by accident.
After a terrible divorce left her blindsided, all Evie Quinn wants is a relaxing girls’ trip to Scotland, not a fight for her life with a Chimera shifter—an ancient, secretive enemy with the power to shapeshift into anything with a pulse.
Surviving the attack is a plus, but her goddess mother drops a bomb on her: Living will change everything.
And…it does.
Now she’s hiding out in a small town running a popular flower shop, doing her best to resist the urge to gnaw on raw meat every chance she gets, and badly pretending she’s the same ol’ lovable hedgewitch she always was.
Except, spoiler alert: She’s not.
When a foraging trip reveals a dying shifter in the woods, Evie breaks all the rules to heal him and vanishes before he wakes up. Cue immediate panic when that dangerously attractive shifter walks into her shop a few weeks later, and she finds out he’s the Alpha of every single shifter in the state.
Eep.
Fortunately, he’s only looking for a florist, not Evie. Not yet. But divine magic brews in the skies, and the wild gods are on the prowl, searching for the source of a long forgotten ancient magic they sense stirring once again.
As Evie’s secrets claw their way to the surface, she realizes she may have to team up with the one man who can save her life.
If he doesn’t destroy it first.
For fans of dangerous supernatural tension, enemies-to-lovers romance, and reluctant heroines, Shift of Heart is the beginning of a dangerously addictive and magical new series.
- Publisher: Oliver Heber Books
- Publication date: July 29, 2025
- Language: English
- Print length: 278 pages
- Book 1 of 7: Shifter Lords
Scattered Thoughts and Rogue Words 