A Review for Immortal Hope: Curse of the Templars by Claire Ashgrove

Posted by Guest Reviewer Melanie

Published Date: January 3rd, 2012

Finished Date: December 20th, 2011

Publishers: Tor 

Source: ARC, For Review

Format: Kindle

Pages: 368

The Blurb from Goodreads: Templar knights defied the archangels and unearthed the copper scroll, revealing the gates to hell. Cursed for their forbidden act, they forever roam the earth protecting mankind from evil. But darkness stalks them, and battles they fight bring them ever-closer to eternal damnation. One promise remains to give them salvation – the return of the seraphs. Embittered by his purpose, Merrick du Loire must honour an ancient pact and bring peace to his cousin’s soul. When he stumbles upon history professor Anne MacPherson, he discovers she possesses a sacred artefact that marks her as a seraph. Duty demands he set aside his personal quest and locate the knight she’s fated to heal. As he struggles with conflicting oaths, Anne arouses buried hope and sparks forbidden desire that challenges everything he’s sworn to uphold. Anne has six weeks to complete her thesis on the Knights Templar. When Merrick takes her to the Templar stronghold, he presents her with all she needs—and awakens a soul-deep ache, he alone can soothe. Yet loving Merrick comes with a price. If she admits she's destined for him, her gift of foresight predicts his death.

The Review:

Wow, this book was HOT!

Another first for me having not read a thing about the Knights of the Templar before and I was really impressed and really loved it. I was a little worried it was going to be a historical romance but apart from a few flashbacks and history it wasn’t at all. This is another one of those books where I feel the need to go on and on about and tell you all what happens but I will try and resist spoiling it for you. 

The plot was good with the good versus evil and the Templars battling demons, where every time they killed a demon a piece of the darkness crept into them until their souls would blacken and the would become a Knight for the opposing team hence the need for the Seraphs who would redeem them and fill them with light, banishing the darkness taking them over. With an angelic prophecy of the Seraphs coming, Anne is the first and brings with her the hope and promise of more to break the curse and turn the tide of the war.

The characters are great Anne is a modern woman who knows what she wants and isn’t afraid to voice her opinions. She is stubborn and refuses to back down or be told what to do, She doesn’t want to be there, she has stuff to do - so she’s in for some fun when she meets Merrick who seems only one step up from a caveman, especially as when they first meet he throws her over his shoulder and carts her away from her life. Merrick is stoic, a leader amongst the Templar and doesn’t have long before the darkness takes him over; he’s also just as stubborn as Anne. He is used to being obeyed and people doing as he tells them so you can imagine the frustration Anne brings out in him. Their clashes made for fun reading as they gave us a battle of wills while all the time warming to each other which in turn gave us some tender moments that warned the heart and some super-hot moments that warmed *ahem* other places. I did feel a bit sorry for Anne being dragged away from everything she knows, her career, her life, her family and expected to pledge herself to a stranger from a time long ago. If it were me I’d be trying to escape at every given opportunity. Not only that but she is thrust into a sanctuary full of men, hundreds of men who took a vow of chastity and they all know she is salvation for one of them, so yeah it causes problems but that is to be expected at the testosterone explosion between the men. I felt for Merrick also though because he had also taken a vow of chastity and truly struggled with his feelings for Anne and the belief that she was not his, that was when we got to see through the armour to what sort of man he really was and oh my, what a man indeed *fans oneself*

You know the path to redemption is never going to be easy for the Templars it makes for better reading and makes you feel more for the characters as you go through their trials with them. This is just the first book in the series and I already have favourite Knights who I want to see paired off with their Seraph. . Declan, Farren, Gareth, Tane, Caradoc so I’m expecting a good long series, book 2 is already set up in my opinion and I just wish I could tell you my thoughts on that too because I’m already wondering who the lucky Knight will be. I would recommend this book to fans of series like Highlanders, Dark Hunters etc. Tortured heroes with the chance of redemption from their true love, who doesn’t love a story like that? I must however advise that this book is for adults due to the sexual nature throughout.