A Cause and Manner

A sleep-deprived doctor seeks advice on dealing severely with his wifes lover. First book in the Matthias Kork, Investigating Coroner Series, featuring suspense, dark humour and physicians behaving badly.

A Cause and Manner is a medical noir thriller. Matthew Kork is an anesthesiologist at a Canadian community hospital. There is tension in the operating room between Matt and an elitist surgeon, Angelo Amodeo. There is also tension between Matt and his wife, whom he suspects of having an affair. Her boyfriend dies in what looks like a staged suicide. Angelo disappears next. Matt is either responsible for these events or wished for them hard enough.

Matt is also the local coroner and is assigned to investigate the boyfriends death. Despite an obvious conflict of interest, he accepts the case and brings in a verdict of suicide. The decedents family launches a wrongful death lawsuit. At the hearing, their lawyer is on the verge of discovering the love affair that would have given Matt a motive for murder. He admits to all the allegations against him to bring the proceedings to a close. This by no means confirms his guilt.

Peter Tinits is a physician in Ontario, Canada. The book title is taken from coroners parlance for findings made at the conclusion of an investigation. The storyline features authentic details and gallows humour that only an insider would know. The question of whether murder can be justified, if it is well earned, remains unanswered.

Advance Praise for A CAUSE and MANNER

Bloody good —Sebringville Star
Effinging great —Mennonite Gazette
You have to read this one. Very effing great —Mitchell Times
It changed my life —13th Dalai Lama
So-so, if you cant find anything on Netflix —Russ Horodelski
Strong writing, if you like that kind of thing —Charles Hamilton, Hamilton House
Pretty darn good —Nijole Tinits
Passable first effort —Lila Cook, Nijoles sister
Not that bad —Peterborough Anarchists Motorcycle Club
I liked the hockey chapter —Father OBrien, Coach, Coventry Minor Bantam Hockey
No blood or blood products —The Watchtower
I would rather have a root canal —Mark Straus DDS
Im a better writer —Hawthorne Didier
Its no Duddy Kravitz —Yale Erenberg MD
Smut and filth —Smiths Falls Literary Review