Graveyards of the Banks
by Nyla Nox
Seven Seasons of Midnights at the Most Successful Bank
in the Universe
Forget the myths and lies you’ve been told about life inside Investment Banking. This novel will take you on a trip into a darkness you never knew existed - and maybe (maybe!) back again.
Follow Nyla, a jobless humanities graduate, into the hidden world of the graveyard shift at the Most Successful Bank in the Universe. Working all night in the towers of finance high above the city of London, Nyla is thrust into a world of bullies and bitches, of fear, vicious in-fighting and grotesque incompetence. When the sun rises over the graveyards from the Great Plague, Nyla's shift is cut short without pay while the bankers fight for the elusive goal of Leadership. Most of them won't make it.
Author Nyla Nox worked herself for seven years in the Graveyards of the Banks and tells this very real horror story with dark, acerbic wit and surprising emotional depth in her complex and very relatable characters. Think ‘Les Miserables meet Naomi Klein in the Cancer Station'.
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Volume 1:
I did it for the money
Seven desperate recruits enter the Building Without a Name to be Tested and Trained down in the Third Basement. What will happen to them when they join the Global Center of Excellence that provides 24/7 365 days-a-year high end deadline graphics to illustrate the Bank’s vision?
Can confident Peter, who kisses Nyla in Cobblemaker’s Lane, fulfill his dreams of leaving for a Better World? How far will shift leaders Claire and Ethan, who rule the graveyard with absolute power (no breaks, no rights, no talking and only one ear phone) go to prove their supremacy? And what about the inscrutable bank-wide institution of S&I whose representatives survey the Center on their elevated platform, forcing Nyla nightly to recite her mistakes in public before she is sent home without pay?
Hundreds of bankers roam the notorious Seventh Floor of the Bank with its filthy kitchen and flea infested carpets, forced to fight each other for survival, deliberately kept in a state of anger and frustration by their superiors, fervent believers in the Elimination of the Unfit. Predators to a man! While Nyla is their prey. The shouting of the bankers resembles constant gun fire, and sometimes they collapse under their desks like soldiers in the trenches.
Nyla has never encountered such a hostile environment before. And no one on the outside believes her. But, after a life time frittered away in the unprofitable humanities, Nyla needs the money. And as hope and dignity are stripped away, night after gruelling night, a mental fog descends on her. Is there even a world left outside the Most Successful Bank in the Universe?
There’s a reason why Nyla’s colleagues call this place Siberia, and it’s not just the icy aircon.
Nyla survives her first cull and eats sandwiches with Peter on the gravestones. She can adapt. But then Vera arrives at the Bank and the Monsters are Arising.
To be continued in Volume 2: Monsters Arising and culminating in Volume3: Slaughterhouse Morning.
You have no idea how bad it can get…
Nyla Nox on Brexit: a dystopian satire: http://news.efinancialcareers.com/uk-en/249458/city-of-london-2030/
Nyla Nox in the press
Review of volume 1 on indielit
Review of volume 1 on Financial Fiction AH
Review of volume 1 on DearKitty
Article on volume 1 on Tony Riches Writing Desk
Second Interview in the Guardian
Article on volme 2 on Tony Riches Writing Desk
Review of volume 2 on DearKitty
Nyla Nox articles
(samples, there are many many more...)
Open Democracy - The Dark Heart of Capitalism
Business Insider - Bankers and All Nighters
efinancialcareers - Bankers of All Nations
efinancialcareers - Extreme Bullying on the Night Shift
Articles have been translated into German, French and Mandarin.
Volume 2: Monsters Arising
Midnight in the City of London. The Masters of Finance rule the world. Small creatures run for cover.
Nyla is still working on the graveyard shift in the Most Successful Bank in the Universe, trying to survive. But the Monsters in the Bank are not sleeping.
The Fittest to Rule continue their cold, brutal regime, and Nyla’s abusive supervisors have absolute power over her bodily functions. Vera, a new arrival, becomes the ultimate target.
But Nyla’s love life is finally taking off. Lazy afternoons and kisses sweeten the relentless work routine. Why should she have to stand up for freedom and decency when everyone else is looking away?
But as Vera’s torment continues, dramatic events force Nyla to confront the monsters (inside and out) and make a very dangerous decision.
Everything is on the line. Her job, her home, her education. Her relationship.
The graveyard shift is volatile.
And suddenly, a very different shape appears on the horizon that will shake up Nyla’s world forever...
Monsters Arising is volume 2 in the trilogy ‘Graveyards of the Banks’.
A short introduction ‘What Went Before’ brings the reader up to speed and this volume can be enjoyed on its own. Volume 1 ‘I did it for the money’ is also available on Amazon.