Honor in the Son

George C. Lukas
AuthorHouse (2008)
ISBN 9781434340429
Reviewed by Olivera Baumgartner-Jackson for Reader Views (8/08) 


George C. Lukas’ “Honor in the Son” hits hard from the very beginning. And the punches keep coming at an inexorable pace. Some are to your gut, some to your heart and some just fall pretty much wherever. While that makes for a very fast-moving story, it also makes it harder for me to digest.

Set in the time just after the infamous Mariel boat-lift from Cuba, this thriller follows two loosely linked tales. One, which acts as the frame for the entire story, is the tale of a Catholic priest, Father Tomasso, who was born as Stefano DiTomasso in Italy and came to the United States as a child. Due to violent family history he is honor bound to an organized-crime group and he is still repaying his family’s debt to them, acting as a helper for assassinations of undesirables. While he has never been asked to pull the trigger himself yet, he knows such a moment is coming.

The second tale, an even more violent one, involves his brother Nico, who is in quest of justice for a crime, committed against his new wife Jessica during their honeymoon in Florida. Whether this is really a quest for justice or simply a vengeance call is something the reader will have to decide for him- or herself.

Assisted by two more “heroes,” the federal agents Lonnie and Stormy, the brothers set out on rampage that leaves a good number of corpses behind. While they are mostly responsible for those deaths just in an indirect way, the body count is staggering. The descriptions of violence are extremely graphic and the author’s inside knowledge of the narcotics trade, due to the years he spent working in the US Customs in Florida, makes this a believable reading.

What left me cold, however, is the fact that the “heroes” are just that – heroes in quotation marks. I could not warm up to any of them. Nico’s adoration of his wife seems to be based solely on the fact that she’s quick to drop her panties anywhere, if she even wore them that day at all; and the fact that she possesses shapely legs and thin ankles. Any scene involving sex or alluding to it is crude, particularly the very disturbing scene involving Max Cagle’s girlfriend, Tammy Butler. His brother, the Catholic priest, seems to have no qualms about jumping in bed with somebody, therefore breaking his wow of celibacy. Well, if I think about him further, he really does not seem to have any qualms about breaking any of the rules, including taking lives. Lonnie is so nondescript that his presence does not add much to the story. And Stormy, probably the best of the bunch, also harbors a dark secret, one that will not endear him to too many readers.

If you enjoy hard-hitting books about violence and the drug wars, “Honor in the Son” will not disappoint. Just be prepared for some very graphic moments and lots of gore.

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