When the notorious investigative journalist Rhoda Gradwyn booked into Mr Chandler-Powells private clinic in Dorset for the removal of a disfiguring and long-standing facial scar she had every prospect of a successful operation by a distinguished surgeon a weeks peaceful convalescence in one of Dorsets most beautiful manor houses and the beginning of a new life. She was never to leave Cheverell Manor alive. Adam Dalgliesh and his team are called in to investigate the murder and later a second death which are to raise even more complicated problems than the question of innocence or guilt.? A chilling and atmospheric work of detective fiction The Private Patient is the fourteenth novel to feature the inspector protagonist Adam Dalgliesh from the award-winning author of Children of Men Death Comes to Pemberley and The Murder Room.