Secret Ones is a wonderful debut that promises an excellent series to come.

It’s a little hard to pick a genre to place Secret Ones into. Although there is a VERY strong romance element, in a paranormal setting, there is also a theme of mystery throughout that moves it into the urban fantasy genre.  But what I can decide on... it’s good.

We have the world building around a whole new race that co-exists with humans, and the world building is done quite well, with slow introduction to the rather complicated hierarchy. However, I do wish there was a glossary, I found it hard to keep track of the different roles, what they did, and who was doing them. It’s a minor gripe, as not truly integral to the story. The mix of the Australian setting with the Irish was incredibly well done. It provided such a definition between the world of the humans and the more isolated world of the gadda, for all that they were hiding ‘in plain sight’ in an Irish town. Ms Murphy played this aspect beautifully, with enough description that even those who’ve never seen the Australian ‘outback’ or an Irish winter could taste the dust or feel the cold wind.

I loved that the romantic element is rather ‘mills and boon’, it’s a sure thing; you know it’s going to happen. Yes, Ms Murphy tries to throw some twists in there, but you just know, from the very moment the characters are introduced who plays the romantic interest.

The real story and plot twists come from political power plays within the ‘gadda’, including attacks on Maggie Shaunessy’s family, stolen artefacts and rather sudden life changes. And this makes for a very interesting plot line that will carry on through the rest of the series, so I think we can expect some very clever twists and turns before the series is over, and I just don’t think this is going to resolve itself easily. Sneaky, very sneaky.

There is a bit of steam, particularly once the love match is confirmed, but the first scene was a fizzler (for Maggie as well as for me), for me it is this line:

“She remained calm as he spoke the world to ensure his sperm did not impregnate her – gadda had not need to practise safe sex otherwise, as infections and viruses were no match for their healing skills”

It’s like a dash of cold water, just a little ‘icky’, and pretty much a wasted paragraph. Yes, I understand that the gadda have amazing healing powers, we get that a little later on when talking with Maggies mother, the doctor, but to say they don’t need to have safe sex? It’s just something that stood out in neon as not fitting in.

My other issues was between Maggie, her mother Siobhan and Maggies grandfather (Siobhan’s father), John. There were several scenes where we’re talking about dad... only to discover that we’re not talking about Maggie’s dad (peter) but Siobhan’s dad, John. It just got a tad confusing and involved a re-reading. Of course, if Ms Murphy had managed to write more of a plodder I probably wouldn’t have been racing through the pages, and wouldn’t have missed the syntax change!

Overall, this is a light, romantic urban fantasy. Our characters are all nicely developed and well written. The heroines are strong and capable, but also secure within themselves. Our heroes are strong men, without being overbearing, although maybe the odd troubled past or dark secret (which we all know make a great hero). 

This isn’t your standard dark and gritty urban fantasy. This is very light and romantic, even with the mysterious dark deeds going on in the background there is still a sense of hope and goodness.  I am looking forward to reading the rest of this series.