​A minor motocross injury flings Roy Parker into the treacherous domain of former Iraqi agent Ari Ciminon (the 56th Man). In this violent world of kidnappers, murderers and body cavity bombs, the claims adjuster reluctantly joins in the search for a missing girl who holds the key to a terrorist plot. Bucking dirt bikes, over-friendly goats, haunted cemeteries and a showdown at Lowe’s Home Improvement highlight the pair’s adventures. Bucolic Charles City County becomes the center of action when a plot to assassinate the Commandant of the Marine Corps takes a strange twist on the deck of the Jamestown Ferry, where Ari battles to save the lives of hundreds of hostages. Since the hijacking is revenge for a deadly American raid on an Arab village, he again confronts his own divided loyalty. But while always up for a good fight, he has second thoughts when the terrorists turn their full attention on him….

I never intended to write a sequel to The Lazarus Children, but was surprised by the near-universal dismay readers had with the ending.  When I finished Short Order Cop I didn't begin another Ari Ciminon novel, but went straight to a different sequel, The Lazarus Generation.  I took great pride in it, but obviously I made an even worse miscalculation than with the first Lazarus novel.  Almost three weeks after publicizing it via The Fussy Librarian, I have received no ratings or comments, negative or otherwise.  This suggests the book is unworthy of notice of any kind.  Of course, there might be other reasons for the silence.  Amazon has suffered a lot of layoffs, and that might include Kindle staff.  I might also be a target of the infamous algorithm.  I have heard that it goes on red alert whenever there are suddenly lots of downloads and ratings.  That might be fanciful thinking on my part, but being a cantankerous old hermit I have few friends (real or virtual) to help boost me up the marketplace ladder.  This all leads me to the conclusion that I have perpetuated a real stinker.  I don't know how this came about, but authors are the last to know when they create a fart instead of a masterpiece.  I apologize for my effluent (as Ari might say).  The working title of my next book is The Big Bruise, another Ari Ciminon novel.  Hope that fares better! 

​The Lazarus Generation is the sequel to The Lazarus Children, which chronicled the trials of a group of children abandoned deep in a forest after testing positive for COVID. Having found their way to an Army field hospital, they are within a few dozen yards of being reunited with their parents when they are abruptly forced onto a waiting bus. They are told they are being taken to a university hospital only a hundred miles away. But what should be a short trip becomes a hazardous expedition through a land torn apart by disease and hunger. They are not riding in an ordinary bus. Armored and weaponized, it is a match for almost any threat posed to the children. But foes both human and otherwise await them, while they are hampered by their own fears...and a rather inebriated driver. Enduring sorrow, horror and death, not even the cleverest among them anticipates the curious redemption that lies ahead.

As a doula hired to provide guidance and support to pregnant women, Amani Abdelhamid’s foremost concern is for the well-being of mothers and their much-anticipated newborns.  One of her appointments goes terribly awry when she arrives to find the mother-to-be, Najat Tagouri, bleeding to death in her bedroom.  To make matters worse, her husband is lying on the floor, also dying.  Within a matter of minutes, Amani’s life takes a terrible turn when the police find what appears to be the murder weapon in her hand.  Charged with three counts of homicide (including the fetus), her future looks very bleak.

No one who knows the doula accepts her guilt.  This includes Nahibab Sadiq, who operates a posh shelter for women out of her Richmond mansion.  Several of her guests (and one employee) have Amani as their doula.  At their urging, Nahibab hires Ari Ciminon (the 56th Man) to prove Amani’s innocence.
Ari immediately becomes entangled with lawyers, social workers, bail bondsmen, an Arabic voice performer who mimics Mel Blanc, a novice PI, a grouchy imam, Latino and Hispanic immigrant laborers and Lubna Obaid—a death doula.
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But Ari is on the clock.  His injured wife Rana is due to arrive at Portsmouth Naval Hospital within days, if not hours.  Riven by guilt because of a sexual indiscretion, he is desperate to make amends.  His long-anticipated reconciliation is threatened when he is caught up in a turf war between a cantina owner and a powerful drug cartel.  Yet there is more at stake.  A dark cloud hovers over Ari’s future.  Even his cat suspects the reunion with Rana might cost Ari his life.

Still awaiting the arrival of his injured wife, Ari Ciminon (The 56th Man) is already on a hair-trigger when a sniper wounds his close friend, insurance investigator Elmore Lawson, a disabled veteran who has been looking into a suspicious injury claim at Osprey Pointe, a gated community outside of Richmond, Virginia.  Ari’s search for the would-be assassin begins at Lawson’s house, where he encounters Lawson’s autistic nephew, Freddie, a possible witness to the crime.  Both Ari and Detective Yvonne Neumann, Lawson’s lover, are keen to take personal revenge on the shooter.  As a result of Freddie’s profound terror at the prospect of sharing a public toilet at a Social Services shelter, the boy is put in Neumann’s care.  Unable to watch over him during the day, she places him with Ari part-time.  But he has no intention of staying put in his safe house and takes Freddie with him in his hunt for the killer—much to the dismay of Freddie, when he discovers Ari has no qualms about using him as a decoy.
Drawn by Elmore’s notes to posh Osprey Pointe, Ari learns that wealth has its drawbacks.  For one, the residents are being blackmailed by their own security service.  But those same guards have become vulnerable to an outside force they could never have anticipated: Assassins Without Borders.
Confronted by multiple killers is bad enough.  But Ari also has to deal with a lusty housewife, Invisible Fencing, scarecrows, hunting dogs, Dollar General, explosive beheadings, cholesterol-laden killer-burgers, overhead speakers, Brazilian banks, Belgian car-exporters, wannabe Nazis, Blu-ray pirates, a reunion between a cat and her kitten that proves less than heart-warming, and a boy who insists on wearing a biohazard suit as a disguise.  Topping it all is the reason for the delay in his wife’s arrival: his only surviving son has married a woman named Rachel….