You need 12 atma to do atma
The animus books are a guaranteed boost each time you completed 1. (myth rate gain has increase a little)
Novus is 75 Alexandrites and you have a chance of failing those treasure maps if you don't do it as a team and you can't beat Biclops, Malboro, or Mythril Golem on your own with a chocobo. Also you'll be using a minimum of 75 materia which infusing also has a chance of failure.

So no the Novus grind isn't really getting easier since there's no "materia shop" because if you don't have the money to spend on materia you're gonna have to go get your gear to 100% spirit bond and play the range game again.

Not that it is as bad as it sounds but Animus isn't as big of an issue as Novus when it came to "enjoying" the grind.