QSFer E. H. Lupton has a new MM historical urban fantasy out: Lazarus, Home from the War.
It’s Good? to be Home
Lazarus Lenkov has been a civilian for almost two months, and it’s going great. Sure, he’s working at an art gallery instead of flying planes. Sure, his brother is preoccupied with his new husband, his sister is busy with her new baby, and he’s plagued by nightmares and his malfunctioning foresight. But there are good things, too. He’s got a new car. And just today, he got hit over the head with a bottle and then stitched up by a cute neurologist. Who then rejected his advances, but you can’t have everything.
Eli Sobel has never met anyone quite like Laz. He’s smart and handsome in a scruffy way. He’s also a mess. From the first time they meet, it’s clear that Laz needs someone to take care of him, even heal him. And while Eli’s a doctor, he’s not interested in taking on any patients in his personal life. But Laz is funny and generous, and Eli can’t help but get drawn into the investigation surrounding the attack he stitched the man up from.
There’s bad magic afoot, though neither of them quite understands it. From a similar crime at a Minneapolis art gallery to dead bodies in Edina, Minnesota, each step of the inquiry seems to pull the two of them closer together. But when they finally uncover the surprising motives that tie the events together, will they be able to move past their history into an uncertain future together?
Lazarus, Home from the War is the fourth book in the Wisconsin Gothic series. It contains some spoilers for Troth, but can be read as a stand-alone.
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Excerpt
Lazarus Lenkov woke up at 0820 on Monday, the second of November. It was something of a personal victory to oversleep; since coming home from Nam, he’d been stuck on the schedule the Air Force had picked out for him, which included getting up at 0445. This kind of lie-in was a goddamn triumph, right until he looked at the clock on his bedside table and realized how late he was running. His brother Ulysses was going to be on the porch at 0840 to walk him to work, which was a silly gesture, but one he appreciated enough that he didn’t want to fuck up and make Ulysses late.
He rushed through his shower and threw on some clothes. Carla, his boss, wanted him to look “hip,” because “people want a whole experience when they buy art, Laz. It’s not just about the art qua art anymore. They want to feel like they’ve walked into something just a little outré.” Laz neither understood nor cared what that meant, and most of his civvies had been picked out specifically so he could work on engines in them. Eventually, he’d settled into a uniform of jeans and a sweater, and he didn’t shave very frequently, and that seemed to satisfy her.
Ulysses was already in the kitchen, drinking coffee and doing a two-day-old New York Times crossword puzzle.
He raised an eyebrow when Laz emerged from the stairwell, and offered him a mug.
“Thanks,” Laz said. He looked around. His grandmother, usually grumbling around the kitchen at this hour, was conspicuous in her absence. “Where’s Babushka?”
“She went out just as I arrived.” He held out Laz’s coat. “Think she was going over to see Celeste and the baby. You good? Can we go?”
As an explanation it was fine. Lila, the family’s first great grandchild, was nearly six weeks old, and Babushka doted on her. But he wasn’t sure he believed that was the only reason she’d made herself scarce around the time of Ulysses’s arrival. “Are you guys—”
Ulysses shook his head. “Don’t worry about it.”
Laz shrugged. “I wasn’t going to worry about it.” He followed Ulysses through the house, juggling his coffee cup from hand to hand as he pulled the coat on and buttoned it. “I just want to know what weird bullshit I’m going to have to listen to both of you bitching about for the next couple months.”
Ulysses finished his coffee and left the empty mug on the corner of the porch. “Things are fine between us.”
“Is that why you and Sam didn’t come to the Samhain party?”
Silence.
“Are you two coming to dinner Sunday?”
They started down Gilman toward State Street. The sun was just touching the tops of the trees without spilling over into the street, making it feel like twilight despite the hour. It was late autumn, and most of the leaves were gone; the ones remaining were brown and curled, shaking against the breeze. Ulysses walked quietly for a while. Then, unconvincingly, he asked, “Is there dinner on Sunday?” Like he was playing some sort of game.
Fine. “Do you need an invitation?” Laz asked. His coffee was cooling rapidly in the chilly air, but he put off taking another sip to dig a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket.
Ulysses waved them away when he offered. “Are you inviting me now?”
“Do you doubt that I am?” He lit a cigarette, then juggled the lighter and pack away without spilling any coffee. It was going to be a good day.
Ulysses’s eyes narrowed. “Would you say that I’m typically the type who doubts things?”
“Would it surprise you if I said yes?” Laz said, struggling to keep his face straight.
“Should I be offended by that?”
Laz wanted to say, “What do you think?” but it sounded too much like a rhetorical question, which would have been a loss. Instead, he squinted and said, “Do you find yourself getting offended a lot when we talk?”
“Do you really want me to answer that?” Ulysses shot back.
“Do you think that I think you should be offended by me?”
Ulysses took a deep breath. “What if, instead of this dinner, you and I went out for a drink on Saturday?”
“Without Sam?”
Ulysses made a face. “Would it bother you if he were there?”
“Would it bother you if I said we should go by ourselves?”
“Do you think that I get bothered by that kind of request?”
“I think you wouldn’t admit it,” Laz said without thinking.
“Statement!” Ulysses said, and snapped his fingers. “I win.”
“Damn you,” Laz said, and laughed. “Saturday, then? Boys’ night?”
“Sure.” They’d reached State Street, where Ulysses would turn right and continue on to campus and Laz would turn left and meander up to the gallery. “Does it really bother you when I bring Sam along, Laz?” he asked. He raised a hand like he was going to put it on Laz’s shoulder, then hesitated and dropped it back to his side.
Laz rolled his cigarette between his fingers. “It’s not—no. Sometimes I, uh. You know, we can do things together. Like old times.”
Ulysses gave him a long look, then nodded. “Like old times. Sure.” And he turned away. “I’ll see you tomorrow morning.”
“See you.”
Laz opened the gallery most mornings; Carla didn’t find 0900 to be a fashionable time. “No one buys art before noon, Laz.” But she paid him for the hours and trusted him to take calls from other dealers, so he didn’t care. The quiet was actually pretty nice, most of the time.
He put the coffee on in the back room and went through the mail. He swept the floors and dusted the frames. And then he waited.
Author Bio
E. H. Lupton (she/they) lives in Madison, WI. Her debut novel, Dionysus in Wisconsin (2023) was a finalist for a Lambda Literary award in gay romance and a Midwest Book Award in fantasy. Its sequels, Old Time Religion and Troth, were released in 2024, and Lazarus, Home from the War was released in May 2025. Lupton is also the author of the novella The Joy of Fishes (Vagabondage Press, 2013) and half the duo behind the hit podcast Ask a Medievalist. Her poetry has been published in various journals, including Paranoid Tree, Uncanny Science Fiction, and House of Zolo’s Journal of Speculative Literature. In her free time, she enjoys running long distances, fiber art, and painting.