Sharon Shinn is an author and journalist with a number of novels published, including her acclaimed Samaria Trilogy, consisting of Archangel, Jovah's Angel and The Alleluia Files, to which she has added Angelica and Angel-Seeker.

Shinn's writing is interesting because she has a talent for describing very complex relationships, and understanding the problems that so often interrupt love in the real world. Although her novels are highly romantic, it is not the traditional love that happens easily and happily in fantasy novels, but the difficult, overwhelming, problem-fraught type that real people are familiar with.

The other striking thing about the relationships in her books is that they affect the plot. Many novels have a love interest as fairly disctinct from the main story, often being affected by it, but not really affecting it in turn. Shinn turns all that on it's head as her characters strive to deal with their emotions in the context of a wider society.