Garven Wilsonhulme almost gasped as his prospective father-in-law handed him a check for a huge sum.

He could not imagine himself in possession of a sum which would answer his every need until he could start making a handsome living as a brain surgeon. He looked at the gloating expression on his adversary's face–a look of triumph. To the young M.D., it seemed that he had become engaged in a social poker game with, for him, stupendous consequences riding on how he plays his hand. He could take the sure figure and run, or he could ask for even more. In either case he would crush the innocent pawn in all of this, Elizabeth. That was a secondary consideration, he had to admit to himself. Or he could do the “right thing” and turn the man down indignantly and marry his daughter and live happily ever after--in relative poverty.

This is the crux of The Long Climb. What Garven does about his choice is likely to be the foundation of his life as a neurosurgeon and the stuff of a great story. The Long Climb, is the newest novel by Carl Douglass, neurosurgeon turned author who writes with gripping realism.