Breakaway Books

Authored by Richard Price; Published November 2024; Fiction

⭐️⭐️⭐️ / 🏖️

Lazarus Man is a book of intense realism, but somehow, it still manages to evoke a thread of hope. It’s a tough balance to strike, and I was impressed that I didn’t feel overwhelmed by the tragedy depicted in this book.

Lazarus Man takes place in the aftermath of a building collapse in New York. One of the residents, Anthony, becomes a local celebrity of sorts after he emerges from the rubble alive and almost entirely intact after 36 hours. Meanwhile, Mary, a community relations cop, works to track down those who still aren’t accounted for but can’t escape the feeling that there’s something wrong with Anthony’s story. Along with Felix, a budding local videographer, she tries to dig into Anthony’s story.

I can’t say I truly enjoyed spending time with any of the characters in Lazarus Man—they’re just not likeable. They are intensely real, with real and sometimes glaring flaws that get between them and where they want to be. In spite of the unflinching look at their repeated mistakes, the novel still manages to convey a sense that redemption is possible, that people can (and sometimes do) change. A message like that feels vanishingly rare right now when cynicism is much more common.

None of which is to say that the novel is exactly a pleasure to read. Royal, one of the primary characters, is in charge of a funeral home, and his approach to his business is repellant, to say the least. Mary seems to endlessly struggle with what she wants, never quite coming to peace with her relationships and her children. At different times, I felt like I wanted to shake nearly every character I ran across by the shoulders and ask them if they were actually thinking about what they wanted. But, the novel wasn’t suffused with a sense of the meaninglessness of life; rather, it was a celebration of it, and this sense trumped the painful moments with each of the characters.

Don’t read Lazarus Man to escape, but maybe do read it if you need hope in the midst of things going wrong.