This Bleeding City

"This is by a banker who is an English literature graduate and has the narrative here that shows what it was like to be in the thick of it, on the frontline, during the credit crunch, what it was like on the inside. But, more than that, it’s a good book because it’s a real proper novel. It starts off at university and it is part of that not-very-much-discussed problem that is the shift from having been part of a happy group of students to suddenly being in the world of work. Which in some ways is, I always think, what The Deer Hunter is about, though of course, the details are different. You’re talking about a group of workers who are very close and who are then smashed to pieces, literally, physically in some cases. I think as a metaphor that’s something that quite often happens. That people go from feeling quite part of a community and part of a group that’s intimate at university to feeling very isolated and under pressure."