A Plague of Mercies by Adam Pelzman-review & excerpt

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ABOUT THE BOOK: Release Date June 7, 2023

A lethal plague sweeps the globe. Millions have died. Survivors are confined to their homes.

Gabriel passes his time in a small New York apartment on the city’s Upper West Side. During the plodding solitude of the lockdown, he observes several strangers in their nearby apartments. As he watches them struggle to survive a world at risk of extinction, he wonders about their lives—where they’re from, what they value, how they’re coping with a deadly contagion. All alone, he develops a vague yet important connection to these people, an affection for those who are struggling to survive isolation, fear and looming death.

Told in powerful, spellbinding free verse, Gabriel’s observations grow deeper and more elaborate as the endless days pass. But when he and a woman from across the street begin to watch each other from afar, his imagination begins to collide with the bleak reality of the times.

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REVIEW:A PLAGUE OF MERCIES by Adam Pelzman follows designer/inventor Gabriel before, during and after a worldwide lockdown in the face of a pandemic, a contagion that is slowly tearing its’ inhabitants apart.

Told from free verse, third person objective perspective, through the eyes and thoughts of Gabriel, A PLAGUE OF MERCIES is a voyeur into the lives of several people during the height of ‘the plague’. From his New York apartment, Gabriel is witness to the small, self contained units in the apartment across the street. In the city of millions, behind the drapes of his apartment, Gabriel watches as the lives of seven people unravel and unfold during a crisis that has all but shut down the world. From the gay couple, physicians on the front line of the epidemic hoping to adopt a child,to Sophie, the young single woman of whom Gabriel watches her every move, to the socialite that struggles without the affirmations of her friends and popularity, and the elderly couple struggling with age and disease, Gabriel ‘spies’ and waits, narrating about the what ifs and whys, the who and how, personally connecting with each without every actually having met.

Think ‘REAR WINDOW’ ™, A PLAGUE OF MERCIES follows one man as he lives vicariously through the comings and goings of seven people he has never met. Death will take some, while others leave for short periods of time, all the while Gabriel thrives through the philosophical and imagined connections he makes without ever having left his New York apartment. The premise is an intricate yet timely and romanticized take on the imaginings of one man’s experiences during ‘the plague’.

Copy supplied for review

Reviewed by Sandy

There is a woman who lives in a building in New York City,

on the Upper West Side.

A man just a few years older lives in a building across the street.

These two people live at the same elevation,

the same height,

one hundred feet above the pavement,

above the crust of the earth.

They can see into each other’s apartments.

Every night before the woman gets into bed

she puts on a threadbare gray shirt.

The shirt is long and sleeveless and extends down to her knees.

She turns off the ceiling light

and then turns on a nightlight near her bed.

The light casts an amber glow reminiscent of a campfire.

The man in the other apartment wonders if the nightlight

is the woman’s response to a fear of the dark,

to a threat real or imagined,

an antidote of sorts.

After she turns on the nightlight

she looks briefly through her window.

Perhaps she is reflecting on another day passed.

Perhaps she is considering the quality of her life,

or the quantity that remains.

Perhaps she is scanning the dark street for signs of life,

for hope in any of its many forms.