Confusing story, and challenging words

I did get the gist of what was happening, but overall the plot was rather confusing. The author used a lot of fancy words (emaciated, ebullient, ensconced, epithet, laconic), so I while I kind of understood what he intended to say, I had to look up a few definitions when I came across series of those challenging words (eg, morose, reticent and laconic).
The cover is rather simple, but I do like it.