Book Review: Verghese’s ‘Cutting for Stone’ – A Scalpel’s Slice of LifePhysician and author Abraham Verghese was born and raised in Addis Ababa to Indian parents. The Hippocratic OathThe title of Abraham Verghese’s first novel, Cutting for Stone, is intriguing, perhaps unrewardingly so. One of the most attractive things about Verghese’s first novel is the emotion the book evokes, the womblike comfort within its pages. Early in the novel Verghese describes Ghosh’s introduction to Ethiopia, “Ghosh didn’t understand any of this till he came to Africa. Take a deep breath…The language of love was the same as the language of medicine.”Like medicine, writing is in the details.