This was one of the most unique “starts” to a book that I have ever encountered in my lifetime of reading, which puts it in a very unique category! The reader is immediately plunged into the demise of the unfortunate patient, which will presumably be further investigated as the story unfolds. Unfortunately, the verbosity of the prose, as the author seemed to be consciously trying to use excessively long words when more concise, apt words would do, was off-putting. As the reader, I was drawn much more to the style and unnecessary wordiness of the writing than to the actual developing story, which was probably not the intent of the author. Possibly that device was crafted specifically to further entice the reader, but for the reasons elaborated, the book merited a “2” rating in my opinion.