RED SHIFT

Lovers in three centuries are linked by a stone axe but more by shared emotional realities. Macey, a warrior in 2nd-century Britain (he and his cohorts speak a jarringly modern lingo), and Thomas, in the midst of England's 17th-century civil war, provide a foil for the troubled romance of 20th-century Tom and Jan, who must contend with separations that are psychic as well as geographic and social. At the novel's center are the permutations of loyalty and betrayal. Mannered but intriguing.