Heart of Stone (Gargoyles 1) by Christine Warren

Hello to all,

  Today i decided to share with you my opinion on a book i discovered with Brenda's event during the last halloween " Heart of Stone". This book was in fact a prize, a pre order of it to be more precise.... i wasn't lucky enough to win it but i couldn't forget the blurb  so as soon as i could i did get my copy of it and i can only be grateful to Brenda for this discovery... i'm becoming fond of gargoyles now ^^

Happy Reading

Publisher: St. Martin's Paperbacks

Publication: 2013

ISBN:  1250012651

Genre: paranormal romance
Violence: strong
Language: normal
sex: strong, steamy
Public: 18+

Source: bought

Short description from goodreads :

From bestselling author Christine Warren comes a thrilling new series about a young woman caught between a rock and a hard place—between gargoyles and demons…

Ella Harrow is trying to carve out a normal life for herself. Well, as normal as an art geek with psychic abilities can hope for. As museum docent and gift-shop manager, Ella is able to keep her distance from people—and her powers in check—while surrounding herself with the artifacts she loves. But how on earth is she supposed to act normal when a thousand-year-old statue on the museum's terrace suddenly comes to life?

Heart of Stone


Not your ordinary gargoyle, Kees has been asleep for eons, waiting for a portent of evil to wake him from his slumber. Kees isn't a vision; he's a bat-winged guardian created to protect the world from the seven demons of the Dark. Somehow, Ella triggered his reawakening. Maybe the demons have been unleashed? Maybe his heart is finally ready to be chiseled open? The fate of the world isn't carved in stone…yet.

My opinion:

          I love it! It’s my first book by this author but it won’t be the last for sure, really i couldn’t stop turning the pages I loved the story a lot!

But let’s start at the beginning, “ Heart of Stone” is a  paranormal romance with gargoyles…yes gargoyles but you must think of them as magical creatures, being able to take human form  ( a really sexy one by the way), working on the light side. They were summoned from another plane to protect our world and humans in general again the evil and his minions …so yes it’s gargoyles vs demons….so they are guardians … when they are not fighting, when the demons are contained they go in a kind of slumber and looks like statues yes but they are not sleeping they stay awake enough to learn about the changing world around them.

Of course when they are in such a state they are more vulnerable it’s the reason for the existence of the Wardens…. Those are humans with Magic  who are in fact at the one who regrouped to summons the guardians in the first place. Their role is simple: they keep vigilante, they keep watch for the dark force and act against them. They aren’t the primary fighters it’s more the recon team ..when they take note of a rising in the evil force they dispatch the proper answer…against simple humans ( because yes the dark forces have they own guild/order of followers) they can use their magic and interfere but they wouldn’t fight minor demons alone , they are minor guardians to help for that too. However when the danger is greater when the evil  is awakening so when one of more of the seven main demons is playing havoc their role is to wake up the guardians/gargoyles ( who are 7 like their counterparts) those nearly immortal are the main fighting force. Normally each Guardians has a warden assigned to his care meaning one that take care to wake him up and in “peaceful “ time take care of his form to know where each guardians is.

Kees has been in slumber since 1703 with a few interruptions for let say “administrative” stuff…. So he is more than surprised to find him awakened by a woman, not his warden, knowing nothing about magic and the guild and more strange…no demon in the vicinity.  Logically he shouldn’t have awaken in these conditions…while trying to understand what happened he will discover a situation direr than  any of the past and without the usual resources at his disposition he must rely on Ella, while protecting her, teaching her the basics and fighting his growing feeling for her.

Ella always thought she was strange… having some capacities she can’t put a name on frighten her and she is doing her best to keep everything inside her…working at the museum is a good solution for her, she loves the topics and  the socialising part is staying at a minimum. However when a man threaten her one night she takes refuge at the foot of a sculpture that always comforted her, asking for his protection without hoping the same statue would suddenly come to life and jump at her rescue from a new attacker. Ella is far from a hopeless woman even if at first she is naïve, frightened and doubting herself.  In a perfect world, the Guild would have found her and taught her about her powers and the Magic but left to herself she has come to fear the force inside her….

When  Kees appears she won’t hesitate to stand up for herself and she adjust quite quickly in the new universe she is introduced to despite the dangers. She even makes excellent suggestions… not a warden but with the abilities to become one and in a way  doing the job already she better has to learn quickly. She doesn’t know how to react when Kees make some 180° in their relationship and while it’s understandable perhaps it  become irritating  at times ( nothing to deter me from keeping reading)

I really loved it and the fact the guardians will need to bang together reassure me that we will keep seeing more the character we just met because right now I’m quite addicted and I so want more *_*. The villains were partly surprising and I really spent a excellent time the only thing that bothered me came at the end… while all the time Kees fight against the idea of having emotions and wonder why and how he was awaken…. He reveals that the answer is all written in one of their books… just like that.. it was a little too abrupt for me and made them look as fools for not having checked that to start…. The tension built… you are intrigued, yes you guessed their relationship had a lot to do with everything  but dropping that story/legend just at the end I don’t know it was like a bucket of water thrown on you and the reason why I can’t give a 5/5 .

So if you love paranormal romance, want something different (gargoyles stories are not that common) this is more than a promising series debut and I can only hope book 2 will be as good when it released later this year. There are more than a lot of action, the rhythm is fast and  yes a lot of steamy scenes if you love that^^

Score:  4,5/5

Disclaimer: All opinions are my own and no compensation was received in exchange for this review

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