Most of the women are sex workers with clients from all levels of society. Most of the men in New Arcadia are riggers who do the heavy work down below. It's the tower in which the owners of the city reside and work so it has state of the art technology and is the most aesthetically beautiful.

> Tower Five (aka Emergent) : This tower is the furthest out. The two rings rotate around each other every day. > Tower Four (aka Bentham) : 'gleaming black with solar paint.' This tower has two rings of units: the outer, which faces out to sea, and the inner, with more space as compensation for the lack of view. Its location is not far from the ruins of the old rig > Tower Three (aka Synth): constructed of 'biocrete and healing polymers.' This is the location of the offices of Belle du Jour, the sex workers union. It also has real trees and plants-not fake ones like the other towers. > Tower Two (aka Viridian) : 'glass bubbles and greenery piled like a stack of river rocks.' This tower houses the school and the hospital, and it has farm floors (where crops are planted). > Tower One (aka Metabolist) : a 'rusting honeycomb of containers.' It's the oldest, most decrepit tower and has little or no security, and it's the tower in which the series heroine lives-in a squat on a condemned floor. Most towers have various shops and restaurants. People move from one tower to another either on foot, by train, or by motor vehicle on the causeways. In addition to the rig, the city consists of five towers in which the citizens of the city live and work.

Three years ago, an explosion destroyed the main rig, killing many people. New Arcadia is situated on a huge oil rig in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Newfoundland.

Company town by madeline ashby