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Taking place over a hazy August weekend, Real Life is a pitch-perfect capture of so many things: a Midwestern university town, frustrations and uncertainty in academia, and emotionally charged 30-something dinner parties, to name a few. Biochem grad student Wallace takes a protective, guarded stance in his relationships, and the weekend holds multiple confrontations between and among his friends and labmates that challenge his ability to keep that protective distance while navigating very white spaces. Taylor's stunning writing has earned him a spot on the 2020 International Booker shortlist.

Bunny focuses on Samantha, the odd woman out in her five-person MFA workshop. The other four women are a tight-knit crew, sharing an overly sweet pet name for each other and gathering together for mysterious seminars. With echoes of The Stepford Wives and Heathers, Bunny turns a slightly supernatural eye towards friendship and belonging with your friends and cohort.

In Hex, Nell is a recently expelled grad student who obsesses over her mentor Joan, and fills her apartment with poisonous plants while searching for a scientific breakthrough that she hopes will allow her to return. The novel is powered by her lovesick and academic ambitions, and the shifting desires of the brilliant, beautiful friends she has made (and encouraged to take classes with her beloved professor).

Set in 1995, The Idiot follows Harvard freshman Selin through her first year. It’s a phenomenal capture of her interactions with the world, and shines in her precise observations and descriptions. She enters into a mostly email courtship with another student, and throughout the academic year and her summer job teaching English abroad, her feelings and purpose sneak up on her even while she’s carefully observing the world from a slight remove.

Weike Wang’s unnamed narrator begins the novel years into a prestigious PhD program, with a marriage proposal from her boyfriend. She doesn’t know what she wants from either situation, and digs into her past and family while exploring the world outside of her program and relationship in order to decide what to do next. An astutely observed book about indecision, family, and finding your place in the world.

Donna Tartt’s first novel starts with an often-revered hook: “The snow in the mountains was melting and Bunny had been dead for several weeks before we understood the gravity of what we had done.” From there, The Secret History unspools an atmospheric story about extremely pretentious classics students at an extremely prestigious east coast college, and the Dionysus-worshiping cult they may have started.

Admission centers on Portia, a seemingly quiet admissions officer at Princeton, and a particularly difficult admissions cycle as she balances her personal life with her consuming job. The story is engaging, and Portia is an interesting character to get to know over the course of the book — but the real star for me was the details about the admissions process at a competitive university, and the loving descriptions of cozy corners and leafy campus grounds where pivotal moments take place.

This may stretch the definitions of a campus novel; much of Transcendent Kingdom is told in memories that take place before the academics. Gifty is a brilliant neuroscience grad student, taking care of her depressed mother. Yaa Gyasi weaves the broader themes of family, faith, and belonging in with Gifty’s research on addiction, and the different ways Gifty and her mother continue to grieve her brother’s death by opioid overdose.

I suspect part of my fascination with campus novels is the pettiness that can thrive in these insular communities, and a sense of relief to be outside of the particular bureaucratic rules that can govern the institutions. Dear Committee Members is a very funny jump into the belly of that beast. Written as many letters of recommendation from English professor Jason Fitger, this novel highlights his frustrations with his lot in life — from personal snubs to budget cuts. (We were lucky enough to have Julie Schumacher on the Powell’s blog with a letter to Fitger back in 2014.)

A bit of a young adult phenomenon, Fangirl covers the first year of college for shy fanfiction author Cath. Her twin sister opts not to room with her at the University of Nebraska, and she makes new friends and comes into her own outside of her fanfiction writing and forums. A coming-of-age story that explores family relationships and mental health alongside house parties, crushes, and the academic challenges of a newly minted college student.