I absolutely love this action packed, swoon worthy paranormal romance series. Sandlin captured my attention from page one and held it to the last page. As I closed the book and caught my breath I immediately wanted the next book. Absolution features vampire Mirren Kincaid and Glory Cumming’s story. While this could easily work as a standalone, I recommend reading them in order to meet all the characters in the town of Penton, Alabama.

The tale picks up almost immediately where Redemption ended. Mirren Kincaid is a master vampire, known as “the Slayer” due to his previous carnage for the Vampire Tribunal. After a killing he felt wrong about he left that life and is now second in command in Penton. The tribunal has decided they want him back and are determined to have him. They capture Glory Cumming planning to use her to break him. They lock her in his cage after starving him. Glory prepares to die, but instead finds there is more to this man then his thirst. The tale that unfolds is action packed, filled with sexual tension and a romance I found myself rooting for.

I really liked Mirren from the onset of the Penton Legacy series and was delighted to get to know the man behind the tough guy exterior. He is a killer, but with it comes a price and no one is harder on him then the man himself. Dressed in black and rippling with muscle he is completely swoon worthy and it was delightful to watch him fall for Glory. Glory has had a rough life. Descended from a shaman she has abilities she is unable to control. She is fiercely independent, and not at all afraid of Mirren. I loved the interactions between the two of them and how headstrong she was. The romance was cute, edgy, and downright hot. These two quickly get in over their heads and it was so much fun to watch it unfold. We get to see other townsfolk, and learned more about Will and his partner. I am seriously hoping his romance is the next to develop. *hint* There were plenty of evil villains to hate and the tension they created had me turning the pages.

Sandlin’s world is unique and I love the small setting of Penton, Alabama. A vaccine used to stop a virus has made anyone whose had it poison to vampires. This had caused a blood shortage for the vampire world as unvaccinated humans are scarce. Aiden Murphy has built the town of Penton, offering hope to lost, downtrodden humans and vampires. Here they live side by side. They are all bonded to Murphy and in exchange for blood they work together to build a haven. Vampires around the world are looking to the success/failure of Penton. Some members of the tribunal feel threatened by them and will stop at nothing to see Murphy and his town destroyed. Sandlin delivers a plot that is fast paced, with tons of action packed, kick-ass scenes that had my heart racing. She does this while weaving the stories of the townsfolk into the tale bringing it to life. She blurs the lines of reality for me and I get completely lost in the story. The characters are fully developed and we even see growth in them. I cannot wait to go back to Penton.
I want to thank Susannah Sandlin for providing this ARC in exchange for my unbiased review.
Kimba the Caffeinated Book Reviewer

4.5♥s

"...there were starving vampires, crazy vampire politicians, and vampire pacifists."

For the uninitiated here's a little Penton Legacy background. A viral pandemic swept through the human population, leading to the development of a vaccine. Unfortunately, the vaccine made the blood of humans poisonous to vampires. Unvaccinated humans are scarce, and vampires are hungry.

Aidan Murphy--the hero of [b:Redemption|13631207|Redemption (Penton Legacy #1)|Susannah Sandlin|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1348944653s/13631207.jpg|19239488]--founded the town of Penton to solve this problem for his scathe, or vampire community. Penton, Alabama, consists of vampires and their unvaccinated humans who are willingly bonded to them. All the town members want is to live in peace. But the Vampire Tribunal, whose hungry members only understand power machinations, have their distrustful eyes on Penton.

Mirren Kincaid was an assassin, the Slayer, for the Tribunal until he received one morally reprehensible assignment too many. He faked his own death and eventually became the bad-ass, second-in-command of Penton. While away from Penton, he is kidnapped by the men of a vicious, calculating Tribunal member, Matthias Ludlam.

Matthias discovers a human with unknown special powers, Glory Cummings. He kidnaps her and attempts to get her to reveal the nature of her powers. When she doesn't, he throws her into the cell with Mirren, who has been starving for a month. Matthias hopes that Mirren will kill Glory, thus turning Mirren back into the Slayer.

Mirren doesn't kill Glory, and when he is rescued he insists on taking Glory with him to Penton. He is unwillingly made responsible for her. Against his better judgment, he is drawn to the straight-talking human who barges her way into his sequestered life. Glory is attracted to the man she sees beneath the forbidding facade he shows to the world. Mirren tries to scare her away, but she isn't running.

But Matthias isn't finished with his grab for power, and Glory is on his hit list since she is a "loose end." Other members of the Tribunal get involved in a power struggle that has grave consequences for Mirren, Glory, and Penton. Will Glory and Mirren survive, let alone find happiness together?

♥♥♥

Glory is "Somebody who doesn't know [Mirren's] past, who isn't afraid of him, who sees behind the asshole he tries to be, who can break down those walls of crabbitude he puts around himself." Instead of seeing a killer in Mirren, she sees a protector. She sees a person who judges himself harshly and finds himself lacking. She sees a man she understands, a man she can soothe, a man she can love.

In Glory, Mirren sees a woman who is "full of life and spirit and joy, even after all the things Matthias had done to her." He also sees an independent woman who babbles when she's nervous.

Speaking of babbling, you'll enjoy the back-and-forth between Mirren and Glory when she babbles and annoys him. Another running joke is her calling him on the carpet for swearing, but ... hell, you'll see.

Not all is chocolates and roses. Mirren and Glory bring a deadly fight to Penton that will have you hooked and turning the pages as fast as you can. Prepare yourself, because Susannah Sandlin doesn't pull her punches. But don't let that stop you from reading this excellent book.

One character I quoted but haven't mentioned is Will Ludlam, Matthias's son and a lieutenant in Penton. Matthias is determined to regain control of his son, and Will is just as determined to remain loyal to Aidan Murphy. We see some of Matthias's play for Will in Absolution, and also the beginning of Will's relationship with another lieutenant, Randa. The next Penton Legacy book, [b:Omega|15954434|Omega|Susannah Sandlin|http://www.goodreads.com/assets/nocover/60x80.png|20386269], is Will and Randa's story. I can't wait to visit Penton again.

See more of my reviews at Paranormal Romance with Lisa Annesley. Sign up to follow by e-mail and you'll receive notification of monthly giveaways as soon as they're posted!

Loved it! It was fantastic. I can hardly wait for book 3. Highly recommend this series to lovers of paranormal romance.

Brilliant!!!!! I love Mirren and Gloria.....

I preferred this to the first book... both Gloria and Mirren are such multi dimensional characters, The story is fast paced and i love how i have no idea what was going to happen or how things will end up panning out.....



The ending of the story wraps up with the couple nicely but leaves up Penton itself in question...

I am doing the Audio and im looking forward to Will's story... But i have a funny feeling Randa is going to be his love interest and i cant stand the voice the Narrator uses for her...

But the Characters and story will be worth it i hope Will eventually kills Matthias!

This is the 2nd book in the Penton Legacy series and I’m getting pretty involved in the plot and the characters.

The first book was an introduction to the town of Penton, Alabama which is an actual town in Eastern Alabama near Georgia. I Googled it but I think the author changed things up a bit to make things interesting. The book version of the town has it being a virtual ghost town, a textile mill town that has died out thanks to the textile industry moving overseas. A master vampire named Aidan Murphy has made it his new home and has brought the town back to life.

A pandemic flu has hit the world and a wreaked havoc on the elderly, sick and very young but scientist were quick to invent a vaccine for it and almost everyone in the world has been vaccinated against it. The Pandemic Vaccination has made the blood of anyone vaccinated with it poisonous to vampires which, of course, humans are unaware of. There are very few humans left who are unvaccinated so vampires are starving and fighting over the ones they can find…mostly drug addicts and the homeless who were too high or down and out to bother going and getting the vaccine.

A master vampire named Aidan Murphy has come up with a solution. He has built up a scathe, vampires bonded and loyal to each other, and has recruited humans to live in the town. He believes that humans should be treated as equals and with respect instead of as food as most vampires treat humans. He has taken unvaccinated humans from the streets and homeless shelters and helped them withdraw from drugs or helped them with whatever problem they had and then made them an offer to live in the tiny town of Penton for the exchange of blood with the vampires who live there. If they refuse, he simply erases their mind of their encounter with him and lets them live their lives but if they agree, they can have a great life in Penton. All humans are bonded to a scathe member which makes it impossible for other vampires outside the scathe to feed off of them. If they ever want to leave, he will erase their minds of their time in Penton and take them to wherever they want to live. It is a great setup and the town is doing well.

In the last book, Matthias Ludlum, a member of the Vampire Tribunal which is the organization that makes and enforces the laws of all vampires, became obsessed with Aidan Murphy and the town of Penton and wants to destroy it. His son, William, is one of the scathe members loyal to Aidan and Matthias hates it. His son ran away from Matthias and avoided him for decades but Matthias learned that William was hiding out in Penton and he wants him back. Matthias is not only a member of the Tribunal but also the head of the Justice Council and he used that position to release Aidan’s crazy brother, Owen, from imprisonment in Ireland where he was scheduled for execution for killing and draining humans and carelessly leaving them for authorities to find on the streets of Dublin. Matthias told Owen if he killed Aidan, he could live and then feed off the humans in Penton.

Owen and a bunch of desperate vampires wreaked havoc on the town, attacking Aidan and shooting one of his lieutenants with buckshot covered in the vaccinated blood, bombing a restaurant which killed fifteen humans and almost killed Aidan’s mate before they were able to kill him. Aidan had to turn his mate Krystal into a vampire in order for her to live which was against Tribunal law. The Tribunal made it illegal to make any new vampires until a new generation of non-vaccinated humans grew up…and nobody is even sure if children born to vaccinated humans would also be poisonous to them. It was just too soon to tell.

In this book, one of the humans whose husband was killed during one of Owen’s attacks wanted to leave Penton so Mirren, the only other master vampire in the Penton scathe, took her to her desired location and erased her mind. He left her with plenty of money to start over again and then headed back towards Penton. He stopped at one of their safe houses along the way to get his day sleep but Matthias had people watching the house and six of them kidnapped him.

Mirren has a dark past. In his human life he was a warrior who fought most of his life. As a vampire, he worked for the Vampire Tribunal as their assassin until they asked him to kill a child. He was known as the Slayer because he always got his target, he tortured for information and he could kill twenty men with his sword or battle axe easily. He realized the Tribunal was more evil than the people he was hunting and faked his death and hid from them for a very long time until he hooked up with Aidan and his scathe and Matthias’ intel exposed him.

Glory Cummings was working at Circle K when Matthias stopped in to get cigars. He smells her and knows she is unvaccinated but what interests him more is when he touches her hand, he feels power coming off of her. He entrances her and tells her to meet him outside. He kidnaps her and takes her to a house, locks her in a room where he shoots her up with heroin and gets her hooked. He passes her around to his vampires who are not careful with her. Vampires can make feeding off a human pleasurable and unpainful but these vampires scar her neck and make it as painful as possible. Matthias keeps asking her what her powers are but she refuses to answer him even when he enthralls her.

Matthias is keeping Mirren downstairs with his hands tied in silver which weakens a vampire and his cell has silver bars so there is no escape. Mirren is being starved. Matthias thinks he can get Mirren to turn on Aidan’s scathe and work for the Tribunal again…or better yet…for him personally so he can help get his son William back. He knows just how to break him too.

When Glory continues to refuse to tell Matthias anything, he throws her in the cage with Mirren expecting for Mirren to rip her apart which Matthias thinks will turn him back into the Slayer but that doesn’t happen. Glory who is high as heck talks and talks to Mirren. When Glory is nervous, she talks. She unties Mirren’s hands and talks or slurs because she is so high. Mirren feeds off of her but is gentle with her. He puts her in a trance to help her withdraw from the heroin. It is how he and Aidan were able to get so many of their Penton residents off of drugs.

William Ludlum, Matthias’ son, is basically a genius. He can hack almost any computer system and is good with puzzles and architecture. When Mirren doesn’t show back up in Penton for a month, Will is sent out to rescue him and he does but Mirren refuses to leave without Glory so they take her with them back to Penton.

Man, I love Glory. She is hilarious when she gets to talking. I do the same thing when I am nervous. I just start talking and talking. I do it when I try to lie too. I’m just a horrible liar. I end up telling on myself or putting my foot in my mouth or offending someone. Glory is one of those. Mirren won’t admit it but he likes her. He decides to sponsor her while she is in Penton which he has never done for any other human. He keeps to himself and not even Aidan knows much about him except he is a man of few words and he used to be the Slayer. Melissa drops Glory off at Mirren’s house while he is in his day sleep and tells her that she will be staying with him until they find her a permanent house or she decides to leave.

Glory loves to cook and has a dream to be a chef or open her own restaurant one day. She borrows money from Melissa and insists on paying it back even though Melissa tries to explain to her that Mirren is rich and is sponsoring her. Glory will not allow anyone to pay her way. She buys a big pot, cooking utensils and groceries and makes herself at home in Mirren’s house while he is asleep. She makes a big stew and puts on one of his movies from his mega Western movie collection. When Mirren wakes up, he hears gunshots and races out into his living room to find the gunshots came from his expensive entertainment center that he doesn’t like anyone touch. In fact, he never lets anyone into his house yet here is Glory wearing one of his shirts and cooking in his kitchen. He grumbles around while she talks away, telling him that Melissa let her into the house and even came in herself to see if he had motorcycle parts spread around his house but she tells him she realized the parts are stored in the kitchen drawers. She talks and talks until he tells her, “Stop!” He has to say that a lot to her. She also gets on him every time he curses. He tells her, “It’s my f—ing house and I’ll f—ing curse if I want to.”

They end up really liking each other. Mirren was scared to hurt her at first but she tames him. They accidently become mated. To mate, the vampire has to really like someone and have all kinds of chemical responses going on. An exchange of blood has to happen too and it did because Glory bit his finger and drew blood when she was playing around with him. Oops! They don’t even realize they are mated until Aidan smells it on them. I guess vampires can smell that kind of thing.

Glory gets a job at the local grocery store and at the encouragement of Hannah, a vampire who was turned when she was a child and who is psychic, she practices her telekinetic powers and starts to get control of them.

A supposed ally to Aidan on the Tribunal named Lorenzo Caias or Renz who we met in the first book, went after Matthias and exposed his dealings with Owen to the Tribunal which got him kicked off the Justice Council and a pending investigation into the other accusations of supplying Owen with Pandemic blood and kidnapping Glory and Mirren. Aidan trusts Renz but Mirren does not. Mirren turns out to be right. Renz visits Penton again and tells them what he did and warns them that Matthias will be out to destroy anything or anyone who may be able to connect him to any wrong doings. He suggests that they give Glory to him so he can record her statement and keep her safe while the Tribunal decides whether or not to kick Matthias off the Tribunal. He knows that both Aidan and Mirren are mated but he does not know to whom.

When Renz asks Aidan about Krystal because the last time he was there, he knew Aidan was with her, Aidan tells her she died and he is mated to a vampire. They don’t trust Renz enough to tell him that Krystal was turned into a vampire. They ask Melissa to prepare a room below the clinic for Renz to spend the rest of the night and use it for his day sleep and they go have a meeting. While Aidan and Mirren are in the meeting, Renz goes to Mirren’s house and forces his way into the house. He sees Krystal and knows she is a vampire. He also knows Glory is mated to Mirren. He tries to kidnap Glory so Krystal tries to fight him but she is no match for him and he knocks her out. Glory uses her powers to take Mirren’s huge flat screen television and throw it at Renz but he is so powerful that it barely hurts him.

By the time Mirren and Aidan get to Mirren’s house, Renz is long gone and has Glory with him. They know Renz owns a lot of home in the South and have to figure out which one he would go to and how to get Glory back. Renz has the power to destroy them now that he knows about Krystal so this could be the beginning of the end for Penton.

Nine out of ten books, I don’t really like the leading lady either because she is too good to be real or she does stupid things like run away from the good guys straight into the bad guys grasps. I just don’t like perfect people. I like people who make mistakes and are able to laugh at themselves when they do it. I like people who are sarcastic and make jokes. Let’s face it, goody-two-shoes are boring and in real life, they are judgmental and condescending. I really liked this leading lady, not only because she talked a lot but because she knew Mirren had a bad past and that he killed people for a living and accepted it. She even accepted that he would have to keep on killing to protect her and the people of Penton and was okay with that. She helped Mirren with some of his inner demons like how he tattooed himself with something by using acid and ink every time he killed someone. She showed him different ways to deal with it instead of mutilating himself. I also liked that she didn’t panic and freak out over everything. She went into self-preservation mode instead of panic mode when things got scary. I just thought she was someone who I would like to be around and liked her character.

This story is getting deeper and more complicated and the people of Penton are facing an unsure future. I am gobbling these books up and will probably finish too soon since there are only one or two more books left. I’m not sure if there will be more written in the series or if the series actually ends. Maybe I should look it up.

www.paranormalromanceslut.com

I loved this BUT... I thought I would like it more if I had more of the back story. Well, it turns out the back story was in the first book and I had read them out-of-order. Oops.

Oh Mirren, Mirren, Mirren, you poor sad soul. Mirren is that big, tough, strong guy with such a broken soul inside and he never lets anyone get close. It sure as heck takes a woman like Glory who will talk her way into what she wants, to get through his tough outer shell. I love that Glory fights for him. That she refuses to let Mirren hide from her and from their love and *sigh* I just love their story and their characters and everything about Absolution! I really liked book 1 in this series and didn't think it could get any better but boy was I wrong. Absolution was EPIC! I'm eager to see how Omega works out for the community of Penton and am excited to dive into book 3

4.5 stars for Absolution!

Way to follow up book 1!
In this one, Mirren "the slayer" was captured by Mathias Ludlum, who hoped to force Mirren back to being the tribunals mercenary and/or his personal goon. During this same time, Mathias kidnapped a young Gloriana, a clerk at a Circle K gas station, because he sensed some special powers he thought he could add to his arsenal for his war against Aiden & the Pentonville Community. When Mathias was unable to break Glori, he locked her in a room with Mirren, a vampire who hadn't been fed in a month. But being a master vampire helped Mirren keep some control around Glori, and when Mirren was rescued he took Glori too.

Thus began Mirren & Glori's journey towards coupledom! A great, though not easy adventure. But it was a helping process for the slayer and the freak. This author has made a seemingly simple & predictable storyline very engaging and fun to read. I love the various characters and how they were intertwined. I can't wait for book 3&4

I gotta say I was pretty disappointed in this book. Mirren sounded like such a badass in the previous book but it all fell kind of flat in this one. I personally was not a fan of Glory at all. I didn’t get the sense that they actually fell in love, I just didn’t ever feel it.