Can anyone recommend campus novels?
I love campus novels, my favourite being A Secret History by Donna Tartt. A recent favourite was If we were Villains. Can anyone recommend any other campus novels?
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The River King by Alice Hoffman revolves around a school and a town mystery. I loved this book, and I love Alice Hoffman!
Alice Hoffman is a beautiful writer! Not read The River King so will try that, thank you!
I recommend the ‘A NATION OF MYSTICS’ series of 3 novels (Book 1 is featured here). Each novel is centered at the University of California – Berkeley during the mid to late-1960s.
This looks amazing! Thank you
Wasn’t The Group set on a campus? Or am I misremembering?
ALL OUR YESTERDAYS by Erik Tarloff. This novel “follows a small group of friends and lovers in Berkeley, California from their student days [at UC/Berkeley] in the tumultuous year 1968 to the up-to-the-minute present.”
Gaudy Night by Dorothy Sayers (Peter Whimsey). Love her books!
Daddy Long Legs by Jean Webster. BY the end of the book, you feel you have been to college with Judy.
The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach
Gentlemen and Players, Joanne Harris
Liked this one
@Stephanie there’s a sequel, too – Different Class.
@Susan oooh thanks
By campus novels do you mean that they take place on a college campus?
Yes
My suggestion was a prep school rather than college, if that matters.
@Susan that works! I guess ‘academic setting ‘ would be more accurate. ☺
The Raven Cycle series by Maggie Stiefvater. YA but soooo good and I thought it felt very similar to A Secret History
Also, The Lake of Dead Languages by Carole Goodman
Yes, have read this, love this book. Glad reminded me of it, will reread!
@Eleanor I also read The Seduction of water and enjoyed it but then read Arcadia Falls and it fell flat for me. Her books seem to be pretty formulaic and I think maybe I was just tired of it by the time I got to the third?
@Kate yes, I agree. I think TLDL is so good and none of her others quite match it
The Yonahlassee Riding Camp for Girls
Commencement by J. Courtney Sullivan
Straight Man by Richard Russo. I’m a retired academic and I laughed out loud at some of the campus scenes. Hilarious.
I’m a retired professor as well, and I recognized every one of the academics in the novel. I felt like a unique personality, but somehow all my colleagues were standard types?
The one I’m currently reading -” Hangsaman” by Shirley Jackson.
And of course, A Separate Peace.
THE MASTERS by C.P. Snow. This novel “begins with the dying Master of a Cambridge college. His imminent demise causes intense rivalry and jealousy amongst the other fellows. Former friends become enemies as the election looms.”
I am Charlotte Simmons by Tom Wolfe
The Rehearsal by Eleanor Catton (this was her first book, before she went big with her second book, The Luminaries)
Moo
Second!!
One of my favorites!
Moo by Jane Smiley…Lucky Jim by Kingsley Amis…Admission by Jean Hanff Korelitz…
A Beautiful Mind kind of is.
Waking the Moon by Elizabeth Hand although it is a high brow supernatural book. It’s actually one of my most favorite books.
This is great, thank you everyone. I had no idea there were so many out there!
The lake of dead languages – carol Goodman
Dear Committee Members by Julie Schumacher. David Lodge wrote quite a few quite good ones. John Barth’s Giles Goat Boy. Mary McCarthy’s Groves of Academe.
Jane Langton’s Homer Kelly series.
The Secret History is one of my top ten favorite books!!
Secret Sisters by Joy Calloway.
Prep by Curtis Sittenfield
Black Chalk by Christopher Yates
A new book will be coming out in August by Lisa Patton! I am sure we will all love it…great author! It’s called Rush.
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/rush-lisa-patton/1126974610?ean=9781250020666&st=PLA&sid=BNB_DRS_New+Core+Shopping+Top+Margin+EANs_00000000&2sid=Google_&sourceId=PLGoP210228&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIzMOsvvGp2wIVkONkCh0kWQAnEAQYAiABEgLSn_D_BwE
I loved If We Were Villains too! Very similar to A Secret History and If We Were Villains is Marisha Pessl’s Special Topics in Calamity Physics. Only that it’s not set in a University campus, but a high school “campus”.