The Secret Humankind: An Urban Fantasy Thriller by Gloria Oliver
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Julia Xero is a young woman wanting more from life, she is in a dead end job which pays badly and has the worst boss and coworkers she can imagine, so when a job becomes available with a company which cleans up crime scenes, she immediately applies. While she keeps her fingers crossed that she will get the job, she is still shocked when she does, especially when she sees the building she will be based in and how glamorous it looks, it doesn’t quite fit with the job description.

When she goes through the training, nothing seems to be too amis, apart from seeming too good to be true, she just wants to fade into the background in her usual way, but the people around her are not even close to how introverted she is. When she is out on a job with her partner in cleaning, it looks like it will be a normal shift, that is until a message comes through and the tension in the van goes through the roof.

It is the one thing she had not been trained for and so Julia is thrown into a baptism of fire before she has been deemed as ready when they are called to a decapitated body on a rooftop. While she is waiting for the all clear to come up, something lands beside the van and all Julia can see is a mouth full of sharp, pointy teeth glowing in the street outside her window and it doesn’t look human in any way!

This is where Julia us introduced to the Secret Humankind and the true nature of their job, to clean up after their attacks. This is then followed with the information that when she thought she had fallen asleep in the training videos, it turns out that she had been implanted with a small explosive devise which could kill her if she reveals what she now knows.

This throws Julia for a complete loop and she cannot process what she has just learnt, it is everything she didn’t want to be again, under someone else’s control and without her free will, but will Julia be able to reconcile with this new reality, or will the need to escape override the joy of finally having a job she had always wanted? This is a fantasy adventure which is full of secrets, revelations and supernatural beings galore as one young woman navigates through a web of intrigue to discover the information she needs to survive in this story which will leave you thrilled and wanting more.

Reviewed by @roxsannel

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