It’s a seething microcosm of competition, envy, manipulation and the battle for supremacy. It’s high school. And those crowded classrooms — or the privileged halls of prep school — coupled with aspiration and aggression and enforced proximity make the halls of academe perfect places to set a novel of suspense.
You’re kind of trapped. Your attendance is tracked. And there are endless secrets, hiding places and possibilities for blackmail. Plus, your teachers and professors can change your life — and you could change theirs.
Of course everybody wants to go to Hogwarts — there’s a curriculum we all embrace. Not to mention the cool dining room. And who wouldn’t want a have a Mr. Chips? Or be part of the Dead Poets Society? (Possibly.) The iconic Holden Caulfield and Miss Jean Brodie came right out of academic novels, and The Wonder Boys, too.
Schools are secret societies unto themselves, but when you add more secrets, more competition, more passion, desire and lots of forbidden everything, it’s clear why the academic setting is so tempting to so many authors.
Gaudy Night by Dorothy Sayers
Gaudy Night by Dorothy Sayers (HarperCollins)
Well, of course. This intense and psychological journey into the darkness of Shrewsbury College is an absolute must read for so many reasons. It has the marvelous Harriet Vane, the brilliant, intense, powerful and strong heroine. Sayers makes this classic read possibly the first feminist mystery, with its focus on self-determination and women’s right to have an academic education. (Shrewsbury, ha ha.) It has Lord Peter Wimsey. And how about this: it has a riveting whodunit — but there is no murder.
Good Girls Lie by J.T. Ellison
Good Girls Lie by J.T. Ellison (MIRA)
Grotesque hazing, tower rooms and a bloody staircase — all part of the fun at the Goode School where students vie not only for good grades, but for the attention of the cool girls in a certain secret society. When one of them is found murdered, the solution will have you gasping — then re-reading the whole book.
Where She Went by Kelly Simmons
Where She Went by Kelly Simmons (Sourcebooks)
When helicopter-mom Maggie comes to visit her daughter Emma’s college dorm, she finds her room empty and her dormmates seeming less sisterly and more sinister. And of course, there’s the boy. The one listed as “future husband” on Emma’s phone. The one Maggie has never heard of. Helicopter-mom wants answers. And whoa. She finds them.
The Sea of Lost Girls by Carol Goodman
The Sea of Lost Girls by Carol Goodman (William Morrow)
When we read “prestigious prep school” and we know the author is the manipulative, gaslighty (in a good way), amazing Carol Goodman, we know nothing good is going to happen in those halls of privilege. Her newest novel is relentlessly harrowing (again, in a good way). A dead girl. An accused son. A school with a secret past. There’s even a scene in which a man is accused of murder during the class production of The Crucible — ooh!
The Secret History by Donna Tartt
The Secret History by Donna Tartt (Alfred A. Knopf)
Remember when you first read this? It’s still that good. Beguiled by their charismatic professor, a group of clever, eccentric misfits at an elite New England college bond and conspire — discovering things about themselves they could never have predicted. It’s still chilling and unique. Tartt’s voice is still astonishing. It’s the most atmospheric novel about loyalty, envy, peer pressure and the power of a secret. Lord of the Flies, but with mostly cool kids. Haunting and memorable, this book is one of a kind.
The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas
The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas (Balzer + Bray)
And in The Hate U Give, Thomas makes worlds collide in her timely and honest examination of how the pressure to balance your identity as a student at a fancy prep school, your racial identity and your identity at home can turn into an intense, life-changing drama.
One of Us is Lying by Karen McManus
One of Us is Lying by Karen McManus (Delacorte Press)
Perfect for YA readers: High school, how bad can it get? Well, blackmail, cheating, gossip, manipulation, lying, police brutality, racism and murder. The novels of Thomas, McManus and Urban take us back to those gruesome-as-only-high-school-can-be days where everything seems to be high-stakes and intensely important, but sometimes, more than feelings get hurt. One reviewer described McManus’s One of Us Is Lying as “Pretty Little Liars meets The Breakfast Club.” (If I remember correctly, my high school was just like that.)
All Your Twisted Secrets by Diana Urban
All Your Twisted Secrets by Diana Urban (HarperTeen)
And talk about game-playing: Urban’s Christie-esque All Your Twisted Secrets brings a group of students into a deadly real-life game of Clue.
The Library of Legends by Janie Chang
The Library of Legends by Janie Chang (William Morrow)
Chang’s university is a movable school. This novel is — listen to this — about a group from a Chinese university escaping the Japanese invasion of 1937. A group of classmates has been entrusted with the safekeeping of a priceless treasure, a 500-year-old collection of myths and folklore known as the Library of Legends. Okay, it’s not in a school, but it’s about a school — and about learning how the bonds of knowledge, and our responsibilities to our classmates and to history, can send us on a life-changing journey.
Drowning with Others by Linda Keir
Drowning with Others by Linda Keir (Lake Union)
Such a terrific mystery! When a journalism class at the prestigious Glenlake Academy begins to investigate the cold case of a mysterious car (and body) found at the bottom of a swimming hole on campus, suspects include one student’s charming and happily married parents — and Glenlake alums. And whoa. They have secrets. Sinister, sophisticated and elegantly structured, Drowning with Others is a landmine of suspense.
The Lying Game by Ruth Ware
The Lying Game by Ruth Ware (Scout Press)
Ware brilliantly twists her readers’ minds yet again when mean girls must face the consequences of the games played by their boarding school clique. We are taken to the creepy and sinister Salten School — not the hoity-toity prep school you might first imagine, but a little bit seedy, and little bit iffy, and a whole lot sinister. It’s set near the cliffs of the English Channel (not a good sign). Four inseparable pals concoct their special, super-fun “lying game” where telling lies is their sport. But when the school’s eccentric art teacher is found dead, the stakes in the lying game get higher than the girls ever imagined.
And yes, yes, The Ninth House is on my nightstand. Should I have added This Side of Paradise? Donna Parker, Student Body President? Moo? See why this is a great topic? It proves that those of us who were misfits in high school were simply accumulating story ideas.
