Book Description

This is the second edition of the 2014 bestselling medical-legal novel. Dr. Nico Antone, an anesthesiologist at Stanford University, is married to Alexandra, a high-powered real estate agent obsessed with money. Their son, Johnny, an 11th-grader with immense potential, struggles to get the grades he'll need to attend an Ivy League college. After a screaming match with Alexandra, Nico moves himself and Johnny from Palo Alto, California, to his frozen childhood home of Hibbing, Minnesota. The move helps Johnny improve his grades and thus seem more attractive to universities, but Nico loves the freedom from his wife. Hibbing also happens to be the hometown of music icon Bob Dylan. Joining the hospital staff, Nico runs afoul of a psychotic nurse anesthetist who calls himself Bobby Dylan, who plays Dylan songs twice a week in a bar called Heaven's Door, and who believes he is the real Bob Dylan. As Nico and Johnny settle in at Hibbing, their lives turn around, until the soulless Alexandra dies, which accelerates the downfall of Dr. Antone, who is accused of her murder. The medical realism and subsequent courtroom realism and big university atmosphere versus small Minnesota town make this novel ring true. The author's medical expertise is central to the plot, and the author's career as a medical expert witness brings sizzling energy to the concluding courtroom scenes.