Manhattan Gothic — Mel Arrighi

Carl Hopkins, a wordly-wise New York writer, needs material for a new book to cure a bout of writer's block and help pay off his alimony debts. When he meets Mirella Ludovisi, a sensuously beautiful Italian aristocrat, he senses that this aristocratic woman could provide the story he's looking for. Mirella's wealthy American fiance, once a friend of Carls, has recently died in mysterious circumstances, and there are dark rumors about the role she may have played in her lover's death. Powerfully drawn by her beauty and his own curiosity, Carl plunges into an affair with her.

One shocking discovery follows another, and Carl finds himself living out a gothic story that is stranger and more terrifying than anything he can devise on paper. In danger of losing everything- his career, the decent woman who loves him, and perhaps even his life, he still compulsively pursues the elusive secret that lies at the heart of Mirella's mystery.