What To Read

Pull up a worn mahogany armchair, dust off your leather-bound Lord Byron, and lock the door to keep out those depraved professors and murderous Classics scholars. This crisp Edinburgh eve, we’re settling in for a literary tour of some of the best Dark Academia books. That melancholy, tweed-rocking, Oscar Wilde-quipping Internet subculture and de facto literary genre that swept into our locked- down hearts during the plague. 

From the gloomy Tumblrs of yore to the explosion of prep vignettes on TikTok, the Dark Academia book aesthetic runs like wild ivy through the Internet—and its literary roots run deep. Many lit scholars credit Donna Tartt’s The Secret History (1992) as the forebear of the phenomenon. Others say it is a natural evolution of the bildungsroman of the campus novel.

Another theory for the popularity of dark academia novels is that Harry Potter inculcated an entire generation of kids with some romantic notion of Hogwarts. The current wild popularity of Tim Burton's Wednesday series carries on that torch. One thing’s for sure. The fetish for collegiate intrigue exploded when homebound college students began longing for the trappings of their campus lives during the pandemic.

Dusting off classics from Ovid to the Brontës to E.M. Forster is one way you might transport yourself to an elite intellectual bastion, living only for the pursuit of knowledge… but for those more tempted by the dark secrets and mystery of the academic lifestyle, we’ve assembled 10 contemporary dark academia books that will tap into your dark academic vibe.

But first, the quintessential dark academia novel:

The Secret History by Donna Tartt

“The ur-campus novel, the ur-dark academia text, the ur-autumn murder/mood board.” — Emily Temple, via LitHub

1. Bunny by Mona Awad

"A subversive, darkly hilarious look at the dark underbelly of an elite graduate writing program in a cloistered New England town. It's grotesque and visceral, simultaneously surreal and achingly familiar—and, yes, there are bunnies, both real and, like, too real." — Kristin Iversen, via Nylon

2. My Last Innocent Year by Daisy Alpert Florin

"Florin nails the dynamics of writing workshops and the mood of 1990s riot girls-type feminism, both set against an elegiac portrait of New England campus life: the college-town bars, the English department parties, skinny-dipping in the river." — Marion Winik, via The Weekly Reader

3. Babel by R.F. Kuang

“With Babel, Kuang expands the genre even further, building a dynasty of political and scholarly corruption that asks us to question everything we know about power, privilege, and knowledge.” — Kirby Beaton, via Oprah Daily

4. I Have Some Questions for You by Rebecca Makkai

"A New Hampshire boarding school in winter, snow-marbled; an unsolved mystery; the shadows of dark academia -- all weave together in a spellbinding work that underscores how we’re constrained within the bubbles of our biases.” — Hamilton Cain, via The New York Times

5. Trust Exercise by Susan Choi

“[Trust Exercise] joins a subset of Dark Academia thrillers that concern themselves with abusive teacher-student relationships. But Choi’s metaphysical mystery goes beyond questioning authority, and interrogates the structure of authorship itself.” — Amy Gentry, via CrimeReads

6. The Laughter by Sonora Jha

"This is a smart and hilarious book not just for anyone who wants to laugh at the absurdity of academia, but for anyone who wants to become a better person by doing it." — Rafael Frumkin, via The New York Times

7. Catherine House by Elisabeth Thomas

"Elisabeth Thomas's debut novel weaves a thrilling, compact story that builds dread slowly... Thomas incorporates elements of science fiction as she begins to reveal the darkness at work on campus, but not before readers are eased in with some classic hallmarks of prep-school fiction" — Hannah Giorgis, via The Atlantic

8. Ace of Spades by Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé

“Feeling like the fly in the buttermilk is an all too familiar sensation to African American academics, and Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé’s debut novel fuses the air of petty evil from Pretty Little Liars with the anxiety of being cornered from Get Out to articulate this experience.” — Nzinga Temu, via Electric Literature

9. Hell Bent by Leigh Bardugo

"Just like its predecessor, this novel conjures a Yale swirling with all manner of magic — by turns frivolous, self-enriching, reckless, amusing and very dark indeed." — Sarah Lyall, via The New York Times

10. The Cloisters by Katy Hays

“In a genre popularised by BookTok and comprising of well-loved classics… Hays’ new novel has a lot to live up to. The Cloisters is perfectly poised between the academic intrigue of tarot in regards to the history of art, and the melodrama of fate and divination.” — Ellen Orange, via The Nerd Daily