Introduction to my novel ‘The Hermit’

“The greatest tragedy of a finance bro is that he wants to be known, but not as a finance bro.”

What is the Jungian shadow of a finance professional? What’s behind his persona, his public face? Neither Jordan Belfort (The Wolf of Wall Street), nor Michael Lewis (Liar’s Poker, The Big Short) bother themselves with that hidden but consequential feature of a man of action. They give us juicy bits about behind-the-scenes shenanigans, but steer clear from pondering on the underlying cause of those shenanigans. What we see is public masks––very entertaining, but superficial. I am interested in what is beneath that mask.

An average finance bro’s daily routine is overwhelming. It consumes one’s mind, spirit, and talents, and leaves no space for even a minor transgression. But no matter how robotic PE guys or hedgies appear to an outsider, under that straight jacket, there are accumulated emotions and frustrations that need to find an outlet. Because that outlet cannot be art––art takes time that they simply don’t have––it has to be an easy substitute. Some choose sex or drugs; others––playing a role.

My novel’s main protagonist, Andy Sylvain, is cosplaying a lot. We first meet him at a closed-off costume party at The Pierre Hotel, where the city’s finance professionals, in drag, perform NSFW parodies of American pop-culture bits. The party’s attendees’ main complaint is ‘the lack of yield,’ and they roast Bernanke, the Fed Chairman, as the source of their ennui. They seem to be happy to pin all their troubles on one man and on the yield curve; otherwise they’d have to examine other, existential sources of their dread. Still, the glimmers of deeper discontent break through the party-goers’ affectations. “Imagine what we could’ve been if we didn’t have to watch the Fed’s every move,” laments the emcee.

What they could’ve been is a valid question. They’re all smart, sensitive people, built for doing other, better things. In his other life, David Solomon, Goldman’s CEO, would’ve been a DJ. Andy, a smart, situationally attuned guy, is aware of this disconnect, but is resistant to its implications. On his 50th birthday, as he languidly enters a bond data into his Bloomberg, he acknowledges to himself that this is what he will be doing for the next 30 years.

The events of the novel take place at the very end of the pre-Trumpian era, 2014-2015, when normalcy had already begun to crumble, and it is felt but not yet acknowledged by the characters. But a trend had been set. We observe men who have discarded their agency, but who are hell-bent on proving to the world that they’re free. The men in the novel are civilized: they manifest their freedom through crude jokes, LARPing, and breaking long-established norms and rules –– a set of actions that one character calls a ‘simulacrum of rebellion.’ We know now how that trend will culminate.

‘The Hermit’ is not a mystery novel and not a crime fiction, so there are no unexpected plot twists and big reveals. Andy’s exit is something that is already baked in (it’s in the name!), and what I set out to do was to chronicle the slow process of one man’s abdication. Andy is a fictional character, but this is how I’d imagine it would happen in real life.