"It's about a writer who squanders his talents in television, drinks too much, screws around and ruins his marriage," Quarrington said.

'"[3] In a notable inversion, however, Quarrington was renowned primarily as a novelist and had a secondary career as a film and television screenwriter, while the novel's protagonist Phil McQuigge has worked entirely in television and is only beginning to work on his first novel.

[4] However, in some other interviews, instead of emphasizing the autobiographical aspects, Quarrington described the novel as what would have happened if he had been the author of Mystic River instead of Dennis Lehane.

[1] In the novel, television writer Phil McQuigge is haunted by memories of a childhood incident when he, his brother and a classmate named Norman were accosted and tied up in a ravine by two violent older boys; however, he lost touch with Norman soon afterward and has never fully understood what happened.

[6] It stars Geraint Wyn Davies and Ted Dykstra as Phil McQuigge and his brother Jay.