Heroin Jesus

By Brian R. Smith

When a young woman overdoses beneath a St. Louis overpass, former ER nurse Mara Quinn does everything she can to keep her alive.

Then a weary stranger in a faded blue work jacket speaks the girl's name.

By morning, the video has gone viral. The internet has given the man a name of its own: Heroin Jesus.

Mara knows better than to trust easy stories. Four years sober and still carrying the grief of a life she could not save, she understands that recovery is not a miracle, and that desperate people are often turned into symbols before anyone asks what they need. Raina Dawson does not need to become proof of anyone's holiness. She needs food, safety, medical care, and one more day alive.

As cameras, preachers, politicians, opportunists, and strangers descend, Mara and a small, unlikely group begin building something practical: Open Hand, a loose network of kitchens, rides, shelter, legal help, recovery support, and people willing to stay. No one is asked to believe. No one is required to perform gratitude. No one is helped in exchange for loyalty.

But attention has a cost. As Open Hand spreads from city to city, those who profit from fear, faith, and control begin closing in. Mara must decide whether the work can survive the man who inspired it-and whether she can keep choosing life when certainty is impossible.

HEROIN JESUS is a contemporary literary novel about addiction, faith, grief, public spectacle, and the stubborn, ordinary courage of people who refuse to look away.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: B0H6YJH8YL
• ISBN13: 9798184837789
• Release Date: June 2026
• Publisher: Independently Published
• Length: 310 Pages
• Weight: 0.83 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 6.0" x 9.0"