Review: In the Shadows by Hailey Turner

This Random Shirtless Dude is allowed because he’s not random. It’s clearly Alexei, ’cause of the fiery hand.

Genre: Adult, Science Fiction, Romance, M/M
Pages: 368
Series: Metahuman Files #3
Release Date: April 22, 2017
Publisher: Hailey Turner

Third book in the series, none of them are standalones, and this one’s changed things up a bit. The first two mainly follow Jamie and Kyle, with the rest of Alpha Team as side characters. In this one, the main characters are Alexei and Sean. Though they’re not replacing the other two as MCs. More like we’re getting two more main characters, bringing the total to a four.

We met Alexei in the first book. Kyle’s brother, pyrokinetic, Russian, hates paperwork, loves food, funny, badass and a little grumpy when he doesn’t get his way.

I love Alexei. He’s a great characters who adds levity to every scene he’s in and I love the relationship he has with Kyle. Sean, on the other hand, is not someone I immediately warmed up to. He was a spy with the CIA before he got turned into a metahuman. And now he’s working with Alpha Team with the Pavluhkin mission. Pavluhkin, who can see the fucking future, even if his power only extends to the next 24 hours or so.

Anyway, Sean’s more of a tortured soul. He’s used to being alone, on missions and in general, and he’s pretty much resigned himself to an unhappy fate. There’s no better person than Alexei to brighten up his life. And when one of Sean’s missions go sideways and Alexei joins him, the two finally get a chance to be better acquainted. In the midst of a dangerous mission with people who could try to kill them at any moment, but still.

And since I’ve read the next two book already, I can give this book the title of the last relatively relaxed book in the series. Emphasis on ‘relatively’ because the amount of people who try to kill our main characters don’t actually make for a relaxed book.

But though they’re on a mission trying to find out more about the Splice labs, the setting and even the pace is relaxed enough that Sean and Alexei get time to get to know one another better and maybe start something romantic. The two have very different personalities that complement each other’s perfectly. Alexei, like I said, brightens up Sean’s life while Sean introduces some caution to Alexei’s.

The two work really well together. And the relationship building is done simultaneously with the mission instead of between missions, something that bothered me about In the Wreckage, which makes the book more… uniform.

This is a great book. I did feel at times that it could have benefited from another read-through to clean up some sentences and maybe a few typos, but other than that, I really enjoyed it. It has a fact pace that slows down when the story demands it, it’s got great characters and I already loved the world that the series is set in.

I’m so ready to reread the next two books in the series. They will feature Jamie, Kyle, Sean and Alexei as the main characters and we’ll get a conclusion to the mess with Pavluhkin.