From the start of Chapter Five of Jim Roberts’ debut novel, The Monkey State:

The best leaders have vision and an unyielding strategy, but their most important skill is getting others to want to work for them. Once achieved, the worker is dependent on the authority and their compliance is locked in – Monkiavelli

I’ve always liked the idea that to test if you’re a good leader, turn around and see who’s following you.

I can’t remember where I heard that.

But this quote from Monkiavelli puts a whole different spin on things.

You can have a bunch of monkeys following you, saying the right things, doing the right things, nodding obediently, never questioning you and depending on you for their validation, pay checks and even their survival…

But there’s no way that makes you a good leader.

It makes you a Monkiavellian puppet master instead.

This is why The Monkey State feels so apt. Especially to someone like me who’s been the manipulated monkey and witnessed the Monkiavellian games up close & personal in corporate banking.

Jim’s book is really a field guide to corporate manipulation, dressed up as a dystopian jungle adventure.

This is why I fired a message to Jim halfway through the book to tell him he’d basically written Severance crossed with Planet of the Apes.

Welcome to the corporate jungle and all that.

Anyway, if you like, you can be the judge.

To celebrate the release of Jim’s second book In Search of Maya, Jim has dropped the price on the kindle version of The Monkey State to zero until this Saturday night.

Jim must be bananas!

He’s dropped the price on the kindle version of In Search of Maya to 99p too.

If you like the sound of Jim’s book and his corporate jungle satire, this link will take you straight to The Monkey State Trilogy at your local Amazon branch:

https://mybook.to/TheMonkeyStateTrilogy