Lazarus Man - by Richard Price (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

In this electrifying novel, Richard Price, the author of Clockers and a writer on The Wire, gives us razor-sharp anatomy of an ever-changing Harlem.

East Harlem, 2008. In an instant, a five-story tenement collapses into a fuming hill of rubble, pancaking the cars parked in front and coating the street with a thick layer of ash. As the city's rescue services and media outlets respond, the surrounding neighborhood descends into chaos. At day's end, six bodies are recovered, but many of the other tenants are missing.

In Lazarus Man, Richard Price, one of the greatest chroniclers of life in urban America, creates intertwining portraits of a group of compelling and singular characters whose lives are permanently impacted by the disaster.

Anthony Carter--whose miraculous survival, after being buried for days beneath tons of brick and stone, transforms him into a man with a message and a passionate sense of mission.

Felix Pearl--a young transplant to the city, whose photography and film work that day provokes in this previously unformed soul a sharp sense of personal destiny.

Royal Davis--owner of a failing Harlem funeral home, whose desperate trolling of the scene for potential "customers" triggers a quest to find another path in life.

And Mary Roe--a veteran city detective who, driven in part by her own family's brutal history, becomes obsessed with finding Christopher Diaz, one of the building's missing.

Price, the bestselling author of Lush Life and, most recently, The Whites, has created a bravura portrait of a community on the edge of disintegration. Rich with indelible characters and high drama, Lazarus Man is a riveting work of suspense and social vision by one of our major writers.

Review Quotes

"Half a century after launching an astonishing career that includes some of the best crime writing for books and screens, Price has let the mercy in his stories rise to the surface. On the margins, bullets still fly and drugs still flow, but the deadly alleys of Clockers and The Wire give way here to a community just trying to account for its dead and find a way forward . . . For a nation riven and terrified, Lazarus Man is the strangest of urban thrillers: a thoughtful, even peaceful story about stumbling into new life . . . Presented in two long sections with a preface and an afterword, the novel remains in relentless motion." --Ron Charles, The Washington Post

"Gritty and compassionate . . . [Price] has an ear for streetwise dialogue and an eye for description . . . A chorus of voices enlivens every page in a kind of urban opera." --Leigh Haber, The Los Angeles Times

"Price delivers a remarkable excavation of urban angst in this story of a five-story East Harlem tenement building that collapses . . . As [Price's] vivid characters cross paths following the tragedy, they compose a searing snapshot of contemporary Harlem annotated with the author's precise observations . . . Price once again proves he's the bard of New York City street life." --Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"Richard Price has long been lauded as an expert observer of urban life in the United States. Lazarus Man, a streetwise story of a small group of New Yorkers brought together unexpectedly by tragedy and the quest for redemption, will only enhance that reputation . . . With his keen eye, efficiently constructed scenes, and, above all, crisp dialogue . . . [Price] follows the lives of these world-weary characters over the course of roughly 10 days, while artfully revealing the elements of their pasts that have brought them to this singular moment." --Harvey Freedenberg, Shelf Awareness

"Richard Price is our peerless dramatizer of the contemporary urban underbelly, reminding us that the beating heart of a city lies within the collective hearts of the denizens shuffling through their demanding lives . . . " --Booklist

About the Author

Richard Price is the author of nine previous novels--including Clockers and Lush Life--all of which have won universal praise for their vividly etched portrayals of urban America. He has written for television dramas, including The Night Of, The Deuce, and The Wire, as well as numerous screenplays, including Sea of Love, Ransom, and The Color of Money, directed by Martin Scorsese, for which he received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. He lives in Manhattan with his wife, the novelist Lorraine Adams.