Take a vicarious trip back to campus with these books that unfold, at least in part, at your alma mater\u2014either the real one, or a fictionalized and renamed incarnation that will still strike a familiar chord. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n A number are bestsellers penned by critically acclaimed, award-winning authors and remain popular. While a few are out of print and may be harder to find, copies can generally be located online.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Alison Lurie<\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n The late professor emerita of English named her thinly disguised Cornell \u201cCorinth University.\u201d In this 1974 novel\u2014made into a TV movie starring Elizabeth Ashley and Richard Crenna\u2014it\u2019s the backdrop for upheaval in a faculty marriage, after the wife learns that her professor husband has been having an affair with a student. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Corinth also figures into many of Lurie\u2019s other books, including as the home institution of the two professors whose romantic adventures in London she chronicled in her Pulitzer Prize-winning Foreign Affairs<\/em>.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n Vladimir Nabokov<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The author taught on the Hill from 1948 to 1959\u2014and this 1957 novel has as its title character a struggling Russian \u00e9migr\u00e9 on the faculty of \u201cWaindell College.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cPnin is Nabokov as he might have been in American exile,\u201d observes the Guardian<\/em>, \u201cif he had not possessed a mastery of the English language, a supportive and cherished wife, and the resource of literary creativity\u2014a quaint, eccentric, rather sad figure, doomed never to understand fully the society in which he finds himself.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div> Morris Bishop 1913, PhD 1926<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Writing as W. Bolingbroke Johnson, Bishop (author of A History of Cornell<\/em>) produced what Publishers Weekly<\/em> calls a \u201csparkling academic mystery.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n The heroine is a librarian at an unnamed university (clearly Cornell) who finds the body of a popular female French instructor last seen at a party at the president\u2019s house; the seemingly accidental death is followed by the discovery of a strangled man inside a locked room. First published in 1942, the book\u2014which is peppered with Bishop\u2019s signature cheeky limericks\u2014has enjoyed subsequent reprints. <\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n Charles Thompson \u201951, MA \u201952<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Thompson\u2019s debut novel, published in 1957, centers on a young couple who are part of a bohemian crowd during a post-Korean War era of shifting values. <\/p>\n\n\n\n It follows them from their meeting in a New England resort town to their time on the Hill to post-grad life in NYC.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cMr. Thompson has striven valiantly,\u201d observes a New York Times<\/em> review, \u201cto be completely honest in his picture of a generation without conventional morals or visible purpose.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div> Richard Fari\u00f1a \u201959<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Cornell is named \u201cMentor University\u201d in this 1966 novel, which was published just two days before Fari\u00f1a\u2019s death in a motorcycle accident. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Now a counterculture classic, the book\u2014in the words of his friend Thomas Pynchon \u201959\u2014\u201ccomes on like the \u2018Hallelujah Chorus\u2019 done by 200 kazoo players with perfect pitch.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n Its protagonist, a recent grad, explores the psychedelic offerings on and off campus in a certain Upstate college town.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n Paul McEuen<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Cornell and Ithaca are the backdrops for this 2011 techno-thriller by McEuen, the John A. Newman Professor of Physical Science. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Garnering comparisons to the work of Michael Crichton (of Jurassic Park<\/em> fame), the plot involves killer fungi and spider-sized nanobots run amok; created for benign scientific purposes, both become potential tools of biowarfare. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Big Red and Ithaca references abound in McEuen\u2019s critically acclaimed novel\u2014from a local dog rescue group to the nature preserve in Ellis Hollow.<\/p>\n<\/div> Matt Ruff \u201987<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThis exuberant first novel unfolds at Cornell University, the alma mater of its 22-year-old author,\u201d notes Publishers Weekly<\/em>, \u201cwho has re-imagined his school as the center of a violent and funny modern-day fairy tale.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n Ruff\u2019s 1988 work, now a cult classic, chronicles the adventures of a young writer-in-residence at a fantastical version of the Hill\u2014complete with a sorceress, talking animals, and a dragon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The novel was Ruff\u2019s senior honors thesis in English, published after one of his professors\u2014famed novelist Alison Lurie (see above)\u2014recommended him to her literary agent.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n Susan Choi, MFA \u201995<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Choi\u2019s fourth novel, published in 2013 and set at a Cornell-like institution starting in the early \u201990s, is narrated by a grad student who\u2019s attracted both to one of her professors and to his wife. <\/p>\n\n\n\n But, notes the L.A. Times<\/em>, \u201cthis is just the background against which the larger story unfolds. What Choi \u2026 is after is the elusive territory of experience, the way people and events imprint us when we\u2019re young and then linger, exerting a subtle pressure over how we live our lives.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div> Robert Mrazek \u201967<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Published by Cornell University Press, this 2017 novel by the former U.S. Congressman and prolific author tells the coming-of-age tale of two brothers from a wealthy Long Island family who are both undergrads on the Hill during the Vietnam era. One is passionately opposed to the war, while the other is eager to prove himself in battle in the mold of their father, who won the Medal of Honor for service in World War II.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In a blurb, the late history professor Walter LaFeber said the book \u201cgives as wonderful and accurate an account of Cornell in those important years as anything I know.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n P.M. Carlson \u201961, PhD \u201974<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n This 1985 mystery with a theatrical backdrop is the first in Carlson\u2019s Maggie Ryan series, which stars an amateur sleuth who\u2019s a grad student at a university resembling Cornell (and in an Ithaca-like town) beginning in the late \u201960s. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Carlson followed up with Murder Is Academic<\/em>, set amid antiwar protests and violent threats facing women on campus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She went on to publish six more\u2014including Murder Is Pathological<\/em>, Murder Misread<\/em>, and Murder in the Dog Days<\/em>.<\/p>\n<\/div> James McConkey<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cMr. McConkey is a professor of English at Cornell and observed firsthand the troubles there,\u201d says the New York Times<\/em> in its review of this 1971 novel about a university in the aftermath of a polarizing protest for Black student rights. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cHe is completely convincing. Of the book\u2019s many qualities, the one that most impressed me was the unforced tenderness that suffuses it.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n The protagonist is the dean of students at the school, dubbed \u201cBrangwen.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n Jean Hanff Korelitz<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The author is a Dartmouth alum, but this 2022 novel\u2014which Publishers Weekly<\/em> calls \u201can irresistible dramedy of errors about a singularly unhappy family\u201d\u2014features two generations of Cornellians. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The parents meet on the Hill in the 1970s, experiencing a tragedy as undergrads that forges a bond. Decades later, two of their triplets also matriculate at Cornell. <\/p>\n\n\n\n (The \u201clatecomer\u201d of the title is a much-younger sibling, born of a fourth embryo from the same in vitro procedure that begat the triplets.)<\/p>\n<\/div> Dennis Williams \u201973<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Another novel to take inspiration from the historic racial turmoil on the Hill a half-century ago, Crossover<\/em> follows a Black student who matriculates at Cornell in 1969 and undergoes a political awakening. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Kirkus<\/em> calls the 1992 book by Williams, a former Cornell faculty member who has also served as an editor at Newsweek<\/em>, a \u201csolid, insightful debut.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n Says Publishers Weekly<\/em>: \u201cWith scathing realism and taut, visceral prose, Williams delineates the rites of passage to Black manhood.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n Top: Illustration by Caitlin Cook \/ Cornell University.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Published June 26, 2023<\/p>\n\n\n\n The University has served as a backdrop for literary fiction, mysteries, tales inspired by real-life events, and more<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":68,"featured_media":23192,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"alumni_hub_syml_posts":[18702,14588,19314],"footnotes":""},"categories":[224],"tags":[],"cornell_year_post":[],"post_folder":[],"class_list":["post-23015","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cornelliana"],"yoast_head":"\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/06\/The-War-Between-the-Tates-Alison-Lurie-2-A.jpg\")
<\/figure>The War Between the Tates<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nPnin<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/06\/Pnin-Vladimir-Nabokov-2A.jpg\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/06\/widening-stain-A.jpg\")
<\/figure>The Widening Stain<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nHalfway Down the Stairs<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/06\/Halfway-Down-the-Stairs-Charles-Thompson-A.jpg\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/06\/been-down-so-long-A.jpg\")
<\/figure>Been Down So Long It Looks Like Up to Me<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nSpiral<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/06\/Spiral_cover-A.jpg\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/06\/Fool-on-the-Hill-Matt-Ruff-A.jpg\")
<\/figure>Fool on the Hill<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nMy Education<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/06\/My-Education-Susan-Choi-A.jpg\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/06\/And-the-Sparrow-Fell-Robert-Mrazek-A.jpg\")
<\/figure>And the Sparrow Fell<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nAudition for Murder<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/06\/Audition-for-Murder-P.M.-Carlson-A.jpg\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/06\/journey-to-sahalin-A.jpg\")
<\/figure>A Journey to Sahalin<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nThe Latecomer<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/06\/the-latecomer-A.jpg\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/06\/Crossover-Dennis-Williams-A.jpg\")
<\/figure>Crossover<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nWhat\u2019s your favorite book set at \u2018Cornell\u2019\u2014and do you have any to add to our list?<\/h2>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"