swap_horiz Decline and Fall Alternatives

1

Lucky Jim

Kingsley Amis’s *Lucky Jim* chronicles the chaotic life of James Baldwin, a young lecturer at Bretton Hall College in Yo...

Comedy 1950S Academic Satire UK University

9.2 Excellent

2

A Prayer for Owen Meany

John Irving's 1989 novel set partly at a New Hampshire prep school and college, in which an extraordinary boy convinces...

Coming Of Age 1980S Literary Fiction Boarding School

8.7 Great

3

Steppenwolf

Hermann Hesse's 1927 novel following a middle-aged intellectual in crisis who perceives himself as divided between respe...

Philosophical Literary Fiction 1920S Hesse

8.5 Great

4

Changing Places

1975 novel by David Lodge in which a British and an American professor swap universities for a semester, the first book...

Comedy 1970S Academic Satire UK Us University

8.4 Great

5

A Separate Peace

John Knowles's 1959 American novel set at a New England boys' boarding school during World War II, exploring friendship,...

Coming Of Age 1950S Literary Fiction Boarding School

8.3 Great

6

Straight Man

1997 comic novel by Richard Russo about the reluctant acting chair of an English department at a financially struggling...

Comedy 1990S Academic Satire Departmental Politics

8.2 Great

7

Small World

1984 campus novel by David Lodge satirizing the international academic conference circuit, the second Rummidge novel and...

Comedy 1980S Academic Satire David Lodge

8.1 Great

8

Pictures from an Institution

1954 satirical novel by poet Randall Jarrell set at a fictional progressive American women's college, skewering academic...

Comedy 1950S Literary Fiction Academic Satire

8.1 Great

9

Look Homeward, Angel

Thomas Wolfe's 1929 autobiographical debut novel traces Eugene Gant's youth in rural North Carolina through his first ye...

Coming Of Age Literary Fiction 1920S Thomas Wolfe

8.1 Great

10

The Secret Place

Tana French's 2014 crime novel, fifth in the Dublin Murder Squad series, set at a Dublin girls' boarding school where a...

Mystery 2010S Boarding School Literary Thriller

8.1 Great

11

Porterhouse Blue

Tom Sharpe's 1974 satirical novel set at a fictional Cambridge college called Porterhouse lampoons English academic trad...

Comedy 1970S Cambridge Academic Satire

7.9 Good

12

Zuleika Dobson

1911 satirical novel by Max Beerbohm set at Oxford, in which a beautiful conjuror's visit prompts the entire male underg...

Satire Comedy Oxford Edwardian

7.8 Good

13

This Side of Paradise

F. Scott Fitzgerald's 1920 debut novel set at Princeton University depicts postwar American youth disillusionment and la...

Fitzgerald Coming Of Age Literary Fiction 1920S

7.8 Good

14

Leaven of Malice

Robertson Davies's 1954 novel, second in the Salterton trilogy, won the Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour and turns on a...

Comedy 1950S Literary Fiction Robertson Davies

7.8 Good

15

Tempest-Tost

Robertson Davies's 1951 debut novel, first in the Salterton trilogy, is set in a small Ontario city and revolves around...

Comedy 1950S Literary Fiction Robertson Davies

7.7 Good

16

Solar

Solar is a satirical campus novel by British author Ian McEwan, published in 2010, following a Nobel laureate physicist...

Comedy Literary Fiction 2010S UK Academic Scientist

7.7 Good

17

Moo

1995 satirical novel by Jane Smiley set at fictional Moo University, a Midwestern land-grant institution, skewering acad...

Comedy 1990S Academic Satire Us University

7.5 Good

18

That Hideous Strength

C.S. Lewis's 1945 novel, third in the Space Trilogy, set at a fictional English university where a sinister technocratic...

Fantasy Satire 1940S Fictional UK College

7.5 Good

19

Prep

2005 debut novel by Curtis Sittenfeld following a scholarship student who navigates class and belonging at a prestigious...

Coming Of Age 2000S Literary Fiction Boarding School

7.4 Good

20

Crampton Hodnet

Barbara Pym's early novel written in the 1930s and published posthumously in 1985, satirizing the genteel social world o...

Comedy 1980S Oxford Academic Satire

7.4 Good