Paradise Lost

Paradise Lost
Patrick Lennon
Old King Road Press
ISBN: 1-880941-45-7
Fiction, Historical Fiction
Reviewed by Lee Gooden

After World War II, the United States were known as the saviors of the free world and entered a period of prosperity. Unbeknownst to the average American citizen, lines and boundaries had been drawn, territory had been claimed and there was an undercurrent of despotism on both sides of the Iron Curtain. The United States government was not above (and still isn’t) lending a little aid of money, weapons and “consultants” to help certain countries with their revolutions, as long it seemed to be in America’s best interest at attempting to slow the spread of communism. Whether or not the support America provided certain countries was in the best interest of the certain countries citizenship is another matter that didn’t seem to be considered.
Paradise Lost is a story about revenge and ramifications. President Batista, dictator of Cuba puts a hit on young Fidel Castro, who is raising money in Key West Florida to support an army to over throw Batista’s tyrannical regime. Carlos Molina, a Castro sympathizer, is mistakenly thought to be Castro and is shot and killed by an assassin Major Garcia. Ramon Molina, Carlos’s older brother decides to seek vengeance for his brother’s murder. In an exciting by the-seat-of-your-pants action scene Ramon tracks Garcia to Cuba. Upon his return from his vengeance quest Ramon is enlisted as a gun-runner for Castro. Later he is coerced into working for the CIA while trying to balance his business and family life.
Lennon has successfully written from a Cuban American’s point of view which lends a different but important perspective of an average person caught in the waves from Castro’s overthrow of Batista reign, America’s interest in Cuba, the Bay of Pigs Invasion and the Cuban Missile Crisis. Any reader that enjoys a Tom Clancy novel minus the high-tech hardware and gadgetry should read Paradise Lost. It is an espionage thriller with a provincial realism and a human element that tugs at the heart and makes one reexamine their family and patriotic values.
John Milton’s Paradise Lost is an epic poem about original sin, the fall of man and the loss of innocence. Patrick Lennon’s Paradise Lost, shows us a loss of innocence when the blinders of ignorance are removed and we see behind the propaganda, rhetoric, double-speak and their consequences.