Lazarus Man by Richard Price

Richard Price has been writing about New York for years. His first book, The Wanderers was published fifty years. But he has also found success as a screenwriter with credits including an adaptation of one of his best known books Clockers, and TV shows including The Wire and The Night Of. So it is not surprising that it is nine years since his last novel (The Whites written under the pen name Harry Brandt). Lazarus Man is a street level tale, an examination of a group of characters as they go about their lives following an unexplainable tragedy. There are some mysteries to be resolved but, overall they are not what Price is here for.

Lazarus Man opens in 2008 by introducing readers to a range of characters – Anthony does not know where his life is going and is looking for meaning; Annie is just trying to look out for her teenage son who is in danger of being drawn into the local gangs; Mary is a local policewoman who works in community liaison; Royal runs a local funeral parlour and is finding it hard to keep the business afloat; Felix spends his days with a camera photographing life on the street. Their worlds are shaken and brought together by a tragedy – the unexplained collapse of an apartment building that brings back echoes on 9/11. The ‘Lazarus’ of the title is Anthony, who is found still alive in the rubble of the collapsed building three days later. Anthony becomes a minor celebrity and finds that his survival has given some direction to his life.

Price is not interested in the why of the building collapse but rather in the lives of his characters following this event, and in particular the role of Calvin, a reformed community worker who is campaigning against gun violence who brings them together. All of them are dealing with their own survival and wellbeing – financial issues, relationship issues and family issues. Price’s authorial eye roves over this cast, dropping in and out of their lives and thoughts, finding moments of resonance between them, moving them all towards a revelation, or a decision point, and then beyond.

There is very little action or plot per se in Lazarus Man, and as already noted while there is a mystery (Mary spends most of the book trying to track down a man whose wife died in the collapse but has since gone missing) it is not a deep one and serves more to highlight some of the themes that Price has been playing with around relationships and fidelity. This type of neighbourhood can be, and has been, portrayed as violent and conflict ridden, fuelled by poverty and drugs. But Price is more interested in digging beneath that stereotype. And in Lazarus Man he delivers a nuanced picture of the neighbourhood and its inhabitants with compassion and empathy.

Lazarus Man by Richard Price

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8.0/10