Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
A tumultuous and often hilarious first novel about one year of insanity at the Ivy-like Devon University, a blissful bubble of elite students and the adults at their mercy.
Eph Russell is an English professor up for tenure. He may look and sound privileged, but Eph is right out of gun-rack, Bible-thumping rural Alabama. His beloved Devon, though, has become a place of warring tribes, and there are landmines waiting for Eph that he is unequipped to see. The cultural rules are changing fast.
Lulu Harris is an entitled freshman - er, firstyear -from Manhattan. Her singular ambition is to be a prominent socialite - an "It Girl." While most would kill for a place at Devon, to her college is a dreary impediment. She is pleasantly surprised to find some people she can tolerate in the Fellingham Society, a group of self-professed campus monarchists. When things become socially difficult, Lulu is forced to re-channel her ambition in a most unexpected way - as a militant feminist. In the process, she and Eph will find their fates at odds.
Also in the mix is Red Wheeler, who is in his seventh year at Devon, and is carefully managing his credits to stay longer. As the alpha dog atop Devon's progressive hierarchy, Red is the most "woke" guy on campus. But when his position is threatened, he must take measures.
All paths collide in a riotous climax. Campusland is a timely and gleeful skewering of the modern American campus and its tribal culture.
Synopsis
"This high-spirited, richly imagined, and brave novel is a delight to read... Smart and hilarious."
-- Kirkus Reviews
A tumultuous and often hilarious first novel about one year of insanity at the Ivy-like Devon University, a blissful bubble of elite students and the adults at their mercy.
Eph Russell is an English professor up for tenure. He may look and sound privileged, but Eph is right out of gun-rack, Bible-thumping rural Alabama. His beloved Devon, though, has become a place of warring tribes, and there are landmines waiting for Eph that he is unequipped to see. The cultural rules are changing fast.
Lulu Harris is an entitled freshman--er, first year--from Manhattan. Her singular ambition is to be a prominent socialite - an "It Girl." While most would kill for a place at Devon, to her college is a dreary impediment. She is pleasantly surprised to find some people she can tolerate in the Fellingham Society, a group of self-professed campus monarchists. When things become socially difficult, Lulu is forced to re-channel her ambition in a most unexpected way - as a militant feminist. In the process, she and Eph will find their fates at odds.
Also in the mix is Red Wheeler, who is in his seventh year at Devon, and is carefully managing his credits to stay longer. As the alpha dog atop Devon's progressive hierarchy, Red is the most "woke" guy on campus. But when his position is threatened, he must take measures.
All paths collide in a riotous climax. Scott Johnston's Campusland is a timely and gleeful skewering of the modern American campus and its tribal culture.
Synopsis
"This high-spirited, richly imagined, and brave novel is a delight to read... Smart and hilarious."
-- Kirkus Reviews
Joyous, fast and funny, Scott Johnston's Campusland is a satiric howl at today's elite educational institutions--from safe spaces to tribal infighting to the sheer sanctimony. A wickedly delightful novel that may remind you of Tom Wolfe and David Lodge.
Her room sucks. Her closet isn't big enough for two weeks'-worth of outfits, much less her new Rag & Bone for fall. And there's nothing worth posting. Cruel. To Lulu Harris--It Girl-in-the-Making--her first year at the ultra-competitive Ivy-like Devon University is a dreary impediment. If she's fabulous and no one sees it, what's the point?
To Eph Russell, who looks and sounds like an avatar of privilege (shh -he's anything but) Devon is heaven. All day to think and read and linger over a Welsh rarebit at The Faculty Club, not to mention teach English 240 where he gets to discuss all his 19th Century favorites, like Mark Twain. If Eph could just get tenure, he could stay forever, but there are landmines everywhere.
In his seventh year at Devon, Red Wheeler is the alpha dog on top of Devon's progressive hierarchy, the most woke guy on campus. But when his position is challenged, Red is forced to take measures.
Before first term is halfway finished, Lulu bungles her social cache with her clubbable upperclass peers, and is forced to reinvent herself. Shedding her designer clothes, she puts on flannel and a brand-new persona: campus victim. For Lulu to claw her way back to the top, she'll build a pyre and roast anyone in her way.
Presiding over this ferment is Milton Strauss, Devon's feckless president, who spends his days managing perpetually aggrieved students, scheming administrators, jealous professors, billionaire donors, and bumptious frat boys. He just can't say yes fast enough. And what to do with Martika Malik-Adams? Isn't her giant salary as vice-president of Diversity & Inclusion enough?
All paths converge as privileged, marginalized, and radical students form identity alliances, sacrifice education for outrage, and push varied agendas of political correctness that drags every free thought of higher learning into the lower depths of an entitled underclass.
Campusland is a riotous, subversive and fresh read.