Harrison Colin. The Havana Room

(first published 2004)
Edition Language: English
Literary Awards: Hammett Prize Nominee (2004)
Bill Wyeth is a rising real estate attorney living the lofty heights of success. Then a tragic accident claims everything he has: his family, his fortune, his career. But this is Manhattan, and Bill has much further to fall. His downward spiral lands him at the table of Allison Sparks, the dangerously alluring owner of a midtown steakhouse. She needs a personal favor of him--to engineer a midnight trade-off in a shady multimillion-dollar real estate deal. For a man with nothing left to lose, the set-up is too lucrative to refuse, and like Allison, too forbidden to resist. But her favor draws him deeper into a web of sex, deception, and murder--and to a secret place at the back of her restaurant, the Havana Room, where a man might find both evil and redemption.Colin Harrison (born 1960 in New York City) is an American novelist and editor. Harrison is the author of eight novels: Break and Enter (1990), Bodies Electric (1993), Manhattan Nocturne (1996), Afterburn (2000), The Havana Room (2004), The Finder (2008), Risk (2009), which was first published as a fifteen-part serial in The New York Times magazine in 2008, and You Belong to Me, published in June, 2017. His books have been published in a dozen countries and four have been selected as Notable Books by The New York Times Book Review. The Finder was a finalist for the 2009 Los Angeles Times Book Prize and the 2009 Dashiell Hammett Award. All are atmospheric novels of violence, sex, and suspense that explore the underside of city life, most particularly in New York.[1] Although his novels invariably involve the money and power that is concentrated in Manhattan, his stories usually snake through the boroughs outside Manhattan as well, in particular through Brooklyn, which has served as a setting for scenes in Bodies Electric (Park Slope and Sunset Park), Manhattan Nocturne (East New York), The Finder (Marine Park, Bensonhurst) and Risk (Canarsie). A movie version of "Manhattan Nocturne," directed and written by Brian DeCubellis and titled "Manhattan Night," was released by Lionsgate in May, 2016. The movie stars Adrien Brody, Campbell Scott, Jennifer Beals, and others (From Wikipedia).