Chief Lambiase

Quick Facts

• Role: Police chief of Alice Island; later co-owner of Island Books
• First appearance: Early scenes responding to crises at the bookstore
• Key relationships: A. J. Fikry (best friend), Maya Fikry (goddaughter), Ismay Evans-Parish (partner)
• Hallmarks: Bulldog build, steady moral compass, dry humor, “Chief’s Choice Book Club” founder

Who They Are

Bold, big-hearted, and unpretentious, Chief Lambiase begins as a practical town cop who wanders into the literary orbit of A. J. Fikry during a series of emergencies—and then never leaves. He becomes the book’s clearest expression of Found Family and Community: an everyday man who discovers that books can reorganize a life’s purpose. Standing at the intersection of town hall and book club, he bridges A.J.’s early solitude and the island’s warmth, embodying the shift from Isolation vs. Connection.

Personality & Traits

Lambiase’s strength is not flashy but foundational: pragmatic judgment fused with unusual tenderness. His mind is procedural, yet his heart is elastic enough to make room for grief, babies, and difficult forgiveness. As he learns to read deeply, he learns to live deeply.

• Pragmatic and grounded: When A.J. brings up Roald Dahl’s “Lamb to the Slaughter,” Lambiase’s first reaction is logistical—could anyone actually cook a frozen leg of lamb without it being “tough, unevenly cooked meat”? (p. 24). His instinct is to reality-check stories, a habit that later makes his reading thoughtful rather than naïve.
• Empathetic and kind: He absorbs A.J.’s anguished, literary-laced rant after Nic Fikry’s death without judgment (p. 22–24). His immediate tenderness toward the abandoned Maya reveals reflexive care, not just professional duty.
• Open-minded and curious: He takes recommendations seriously, evolves from “not much of a reader” to leading the “Chief’s Choice Book Club” for officers (p. 107), and graduates from crime paperbacks to Cormac McCarthy and Kate Atkinson.
• Loyal and supportive: He defines friendship in action, not sentiment—“Basically, I’d be your backup, A.J. People should have backups” (p. 109)—and he lives that creed.
• Solid, reliable presence: Described as “built like a bulldog…a sturdy American bulldog, not an English one” (p. 101), he looks as steadfast as he behaves. Maya’s first impulse—grabbing his mustache (p. 99)—captures how approachable his solidity feels to others.

Character Journey

Lambiase starts as the sensible cop who handles A.J.’s crises and stays for the aftermath. Through repeated contact—burglary reports, hospital visits, the shock of a baby left in a bookstore—he becomes A.J.’s conduit back to ordinary life. Books first enter his world as evidence and alibi, then as conversation, and finally as vocation. The Power of Books and Connection reshapes his identity: he shifts from consuming familiar crime novels to savoring serious literature, from enforcing rules to practicing restorative judgment, and ultimately from patron to proprietor. Buying Island Books with Ismay Evans-Parish after A.J.’s death completes the arc—he doesn’t just love stories; he stewards them. In that transformation, he embodies Love, Loss, and Second Chances, finding a renewed purpose that honors A.J. while expanding the community they built.

Key Relationships

A. J. Fikry: What begins as a cop managing a grieving widower becomes a friendship defined by mutual rescue. Lambiase offers competence, patience, and a link to the nonliterary world; A.J. offers reading as a way to metabolize experience. They become each other’s safeguard—A.J. against despair, Lambiase against stagnation—and their bond turns Island Books into a shared project of care.

Maya Fikry: From the moment she’s found, Lambiase treats Maya with instinctive gentleness and plainspoken good sense. His godfather role gives her an additional anchor, and in caring for her, he learns to expand his own life—his warmth with Maya makes the bookstore feel like home, not just shop.

Ismay Evans-Parish: Lambiase’s quiet, enduring affection matures into a relationship built on steadiness and grace. In contrast to the betrayals of her marriage to Daniel Parish, he offers a love that listens. His response to her involvement with the stolen Tamerlane—choosing compassion and repair—reveals a moral imagination that privileges healing over spectacle.

Defining Moments

Lambiase’s turning points blend police work with personal choice, each nudging him from procedure to participation in the island’s shared life.

• Handling A.J.’s grief (p. 22–24): In the hospital after Nic’s death, he absorbs A.J.’s literary tirade without condescension. Why it matters: He proves trustworthy under emotional strain, laying the groundwork for friendship and future transformation.
• Finding Maya (p. 99): Faced with a bureaucratic path, he instead suggests A.J. keep the baby for the weekend. Why it matters: A pragmatic kindness reorients three lives and sets the plot’s heart in motion.
• “Chief’s Choice Book Club” (p. 107): He founds a discussion group for officers, translating private curiosity into communal practice. Why it matters: Reading becomes cultural work, not just hobby—he models how institutions can humanize themselves through story.
• Discovering Tamerlane (p. 228–230): He finds the stolen manuscript in Ismay’s closet and helps return it anonymously to fund A.J.’s treatment. Why it matters: He privileges restorative justice and loyalty, showing that the law’s spirit—mercy—can sometimes better serve the community than its letter.
• Becoming a bookseller: He purchases Island Books with Ismay after A.J.’s death. Why it matters: The arc completes—Lambiase moves from keeper of order to keeper of stories, ensuring the community hub endures.

Essential Quotes

“Funny world, right? Someone steals a book from you; someone else leaves you a baby.” (p. 100)
This line distills Lambiase’s worldview: life as a ledger of unlikely exchanges. He frames chaos with wry balance, suggesting that fortune and loss arrive in mismatched pairs—and that meaning emerges from how we respond.

“Basically, I’d be your backup, A.J. People should have backups.” (p. 109)
His ethic of friendship borrows the plain language of police work. “Backup” becomes a philosophy: love as coverage, care as contingency planning—stable, unglamorous, indispensable.

“I’ve been a police officer for twenty years now and I’ll tell you, pretty much every bad thing in life is a result of bad timing, and every good thing is the result of good timing.” (p. 142)
Lambiase refuses fatalism, reframing fate as timing rather than destiny. It’s a cop’s humility before contingency—and a reader’s openness to plot twists that can still turn out well.

“The way I see it,” Lambiase says, “you saved A. J. Fikry’s life when you stole that manuscript. That’s the way I see it.” (p. 234)
He reinterprets wrongdoing through consequence and context, not just statute. By crediting a theft with saving a life, he articulates the novel’s moral center: justice oriented toward repair.

“A place ain’t a place without a bookstore, Izzie.” (p. 257)
This credo elevates a shop into civic infrastructure. For Lambiase, bookstores don’t merely sell objects; they make community legible—without them, a town loses its voice.