Lazarus Rising: A Personal and Political Autobiography

Lazarus Rising: A Personal and Political Autobiography is an autobiography of John Howard, the 25th Prime Minister of Australia, who served between 1996 and 2007. Howard was leader of the Liberal Party of Australia between 1985 and 1989, and again between 1995 and 2007.

The use of the term Lazarus is commonly accepted as evidence of Howard's ability to regain leadership of the Liberal Party in 1995, and subsequently become Prime Minister the following year, in spite of earlier defeats. Howard first used the term in a press conference held in May 1989, after his loss as leader, where he said that the idea of him returning to the leadership was "Lazarus with a triple by-pass".

Lazarus Rising is a personal memoir and covers Howard's life from his early childhood years, aged about 10, through to his four terms as Prime Minister of Australia, and defeat at the 2007 federal election, also losing his seat of Bennelong. Published by Harper Collins and released in October 2010, the 711 page book drew significant controversy in his criticism of his longstanding deputy, Peter Costello, and both Nick Minchin and Jeff Kennett.

Howard used the memoir to settle some personal scores, calling Costello "an elitist, who's unable to connect to ordinary Australians" and accused Costello of bungling the leadership handover issue. Costello responded by claiming that Howard "appears to be incapable of taking responsibility for the defeat of the government and for losing his seat of Bennelong." Former Liberal leader Dr John Hewson said Costello "never had the balls to challenge Howard." A former Labor powerbroker, Graham Richardson commented that "the situation of Howard and Costello was similar to that of Labor prime minister Bob Hawke and his deputy Paul Keating."