SOLVED. Science Fiction = Another planet, environmental disaster, investigator, virtual reality elements

[Bahimiron]

I believe that it's about a corporate investigator, something like an accounting investigator or an insurance investigator, in a far future setting who is sent to a planet that is known for its regular devastating storms and floods that wipe out all of the cities on a regular basis, so he has to solve the mystery before the city is wiped away. He becomes enamored of the local culture and ends up sleeping with a local. There is a part where he goes to meet with his employers using a virtual reality interface, his mind going to a virtual office where he meets avatars of his coworkers. He sends out an 'agent', a splinter of his mind with limited metal capacity, to do some news investigation for him while he's in the virtual world. There is a bit where the woman with whom he is developing a relationship advises him on how to last longer by pressing his thumb against his perineum while climaxing. (Which, speaking as a urologist, lemme say, you shouldn't actually do.)

I read the book before 2012, but after 2008, since it was the second thing I read on my first Kindle and the first was The Gone Away World. I read it in ebook, but I think what initially attracted me to it was very evocative cover art showing the city adapted to the forest and the fact of eventually being wiped out. I read it in English. I THINK that the author was a man, but I cannot say for certain. I'd like to say that I believe it may have won some awards, but I also can't say that for certain.

[Bahimiron]

Stations of the Tide

Holy crap, it's Stations of the Tide. I literally finished this post, then idly did a search for Hugo and Nebula winners and there it is.

I'm so sorry.