STARFISHING

Quickly addicted to the adrenalin and the machismo of futures trading, an ambitious young woman’s life spirals out of control.

In late-1990s London, hard-nosed Frankie Cavanaugh lands her dream job as a trader in the open pit of the futures exchange. The setup is promising, in a Bret Easton Ellis way. Frankie, a tough girl who lost her mother young, is pretty, hard-partying, a hint reckless. Trading is a profession custom-made for a personality like hers, but it’s also perilous. Monaghan (The Killing Jar, 2007) captures the pell-mell euphoria of the trading floor and makes the reader believe that those who thrive here might have trouble resisting other rushes—like heavy drinking, drug-fueled nightclub binges, sexual gamesmanship, fisticuffs, thrill crimes. Frankie knows well the costs of getting involved with her boss: Newlywed American Tom is both good-looking and sexually rapacious, and although it’s not quite clear whether the reader is meant to find him appealing or monstrous, the balance tips heavily to the latter. As the affair intensifies, Frankie and Tom have to work harder to sate their taste for danger. They move from prankish shoplifting to more brazen thefts, and eventually to risking their lives for kicks; they graduate from wine to vodka-and-Red-Bull, then to cocaine, Ecstasy and finally LSD. The book founders in what Frankie calls her “not-so-hidden shallows.” These shallows aren’t just poorly hidden; they’re all there is. Frankie is thoughtless, self-absorbed and cruel, and so is virtually everyone else she encounters. Monaghan doesn’t help by introducing several preposterous plot twists of the made-for-movie-adaptation variety.

Deeply unflattering but unsurprising picture of go-go finance and its practitioners; they’re mainly male, but Frankie is no innocent led to the slaughter.