Lazar by Nelio Biedermann

“Lazar is an exquisite and masterly pronouncement that a gifted young writer walks among us” Patti Smith

“A truly great writer steps onto the stage” Daniel Kehlmann

“Propulsive, twisting and spell-binding. Lazar is a bold, intricate accomplishment” Lucy Steeds

The snow of the dying century still lay on the edge of the dark forest when Lajos von Lazar, the translucent child with water-blue eyes, first glimpsed the man he would believe to be his father for his whole life and beyond.

The Lazars have ruled their Hungarian lands for generations. In their ancient castle by the edge of a forest that compels all who enter it to madness, they succumb to every vice and live only to satiate their desires. But the old order is crumbling, and the days of the Habsburg Monarchy are numbered. When Lajos von Lazar inherits, they at last have a baron who can reignite the old splendours, but not even his abilities are proof against the ravages of war and occupation. It will fall to his children – a boy who talks to shadows and a girl who eschews her blue blood – to find a way to stand against oppression and take the first faltering steps towards freedom.

A sweeping epic, taking the reader from the beginning of the twentieth century to the Hungarian National Uprising of 1956, Lazar would be a phenomenal achievement for a writer of any age. With its air of timeless wisdom, it reads like rediscovered classic, making it all the more remarkable that it was written when the author was just twenty-one years old.

Translated from the German by Jamie Bulloch

A noble Hungarian family declines through the decades, from aristocratic decadence to impoverishment and flight – by a young author writing with the assurance of an old master.

About the Author: Nelio Biedermann, born in 2003, grew up on Lake Zurich. His paternal family is of Hungarian nobility; his grandparents fled to Switzerland in the 1950s. Biedermann studied German and film studies at the University of Zurich. His novel Lazar will be published in more than twenty countries.

26 Mar 2026
 

Lazar: The international sensation by Nelio Biedermann ISBN 9781529445343