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The Herald Scotland
30-04-2025
- Entertainment
- The Herald Scotland
From Dead Poets Society to Satanic rituals in Fife
When We Were Killers, apparently, fits snugly into a genre which has retrospectively embraced works as diverse as Dead Poets Society and the Harry Potter series. Intentionally or not, it takes place in 1992, the year of the publication of one of dark academia's foundational texts, Donna Tartt's The Secret History. When We Were Killers C.F. Barrington (Image: Head of Zeus) It's in that year that a young student named Finn Nethercott starts at St Andrews, not long after the traumatic experience of losing his whole family in a hillwalking accident. He has enrolled in the School of Divinity, though he has no plans to join the ministry, nor is he particularly religious. Finn likes old places, like stone circles and hill forts, locating his spirituality "in the natural world and in history". His esoteric interests lead to his adoption by a student group, the Clan Dal Riata, who explore altered states of mind by enacting rituals on hallucinogenic drugs. The Clan get together in sacred spaces to mark important dates in religious calendars, with a particular fondness for the Norse tradition, although they claim that all religions wind seamlessly together around a universal truth. They're led by the aristocratic Magnus and third-year student Madrigal (shortened to Madri), who share a privileged background and appear to be a couple. Laurie is the Clan's historian, the one who grounds their vision quests in his encyclopaedic knowledge of ancient religions. But the one who really pulls Finn into their circle is Hope, a striking, raven-haired American woman with eyes of sparkling copper, on whom Finn becomes hopelessly fixated. Together, they pull Finn deeper into ancient lore, picnicking at faerie lochs and camping at the ancient seat of Dal Riata, losing themselves in progressively wilder hallucinations in their attempts to rediscover the lost drug that induced ecstatic trances in the Viking Berserkers. Although they welcome Finn into the Clan and permit him to be inked with their shared tattoo, the others remain guarded and aloof. It's likely that Finn, with his awkwardness and repressed trauma, would be a misfit in any group he tried to join. But class tensions are clearly at play too, Magnus and Madri happy to let Finn participate, but only on their own terms. Meanwhile, their activities are not going unnoticed. Finn suspects he's being followed, and that his room was searched while he was out. His suspicion that there's a rival group in St Andrews that wants to stamp them out proves to be correct, even if the Clan are reluctant to tell him exactly why. The most straightforwardly decent person in the story is wholesome Divinity student Anna, who is genuinely concerned about Finn but cruelly sidelined by him as he becomes increasingly unmoored from normal life. But even if none of the other characters, including Finn, is particularly likeable, Barrington's fantastical and intriguing scenario is steeped in such a mood of impending disaster that we feel compelled to see it through to the end, even if only to see just how badly these people can screw up. If Finn himself is an uncomfortable reminder of what it's like to be young, stupid, and unable to help making terrible decisions, Barrington's version of St Andrews, accentuating its gothic mystery and splendour, makes the perfect setting for a story about long-established networks of privilege lurking behind a douce exterior.
Irish Times
29-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Irish Times
The Wildelings by Lisa Harding: Hard lessons in obsession, desire, abuse and power
The Wildelings Author : Lisa Harding ISBN-13 : 978-1526672919 Publisher : Bloomsbury Guideline Price : £16.99 Lisa Harding's third novel, The Wildelings, is set in a fictionalised Trinity College of the 1990s. Jessica and Linda – childhood best friends with a complicated dynamic – become embroiled in new relationships at Wilde University that teach them hard lessons about obsession, desire, abuse and power. The novel is told from Jessica's perspective across two timelines: in the present day she is discussing the traumatic events with a therapist who encourages her to write down everything that happened in chronological order. This written account of her Wilde days is where the story is most alive, energised and compelling. The artifice of the therapist's office scenes, however, disrupts the narrative flow and asks the reader to suspend too much disbelief as regards the plausibility of that construct. Memory does not unspool neatly like this. The reader is immersed in the dream-like surrealism, and high drama, of the 1990s before being interrupted by the therapist asking a question of Jessica as if she too is reading it in real time. With this device, the aim may have been deliberate absurdity, to underscore the character's philosophical quest to derive meaning from the past, but the execution nonetheless takes away more than it adds. Perhaps this framing was borne out of an anxiety that readers would struggle to feel empathy for Jessica – who, although drawn with great psychological acuity and depth, will inevitably be judged on her likeability. This problematic response from readers who struggle to engage or connect with flawed, and therefore human, women characters is an ongoing battle in publishing. READ MORE Harding's previous novels have demonstrated also that she is unafraid to write complex, contradictory, nonconforming women who are authentic products of their past hurts. This is to her great credit, and yet, placing her protagonist in a therapist's office where she must explain her behaviour may betray an anxiety that readers will struggle to understand Jessica without this exposition. [ 'I don't think there is anyone in Ireland whose life hasn't been touched by addiction' Opens in new window ] Harding's publisher is marketing this novel as one for fans of The Secret History by the Pulitzer Prize winner Donna Tartt . As in life, comparison is the thief of joy, and so they do Harding a disservice here by creating that expectation. Fans of Harding's previous novels, however, will not be disappointed as this novel is an excellent illustration of the writerly sensibilities that have won her past acclaim.
The Independent
26-03-2025
- Entertainment
- The Independent
Queen Camilla celebrates ‘magic of storytelling' in star-studded launch of new national reading medal
Austen and aliens might not be the most obvious literary line-up – but they were all present, in one way or another, as Queen Camilla launched a new national honour to celebrate the unsung heroes of reading. From Sense and Sensibility to Alien actor Sigourney Weaver, storytelling took centre stage at Clarence House on Tuesday evening, as the Queen's Reading Room marked its fourth anniversary with the unveiling of its most ambitious project yet: a medal to spotlight the community champions keeping the joy of books alive – one borrowed paperback, library visit or local book club at a time. Weaver, Dame Joanna Lumley, Helena Bonham Carter, Adjoa Andoh, Richard E Grant and Jonathan Dimbleby, were all in attendance at the star-studded event, to show their support for the initiative. Authors including The Secret History 's Donna Tartt, Alex Rider creator Anthony Horowitz, Life After Life author Kate Atkinson, crime writer Peter James, and Raven Black author Ann Cleeves, were also present. Welcoming guests at the reception, the Queen entered with her husband King Charles as she celebrated the 'magic of storytelling'. She said the act of reading is not a solitary affair but that its impact 'lies in its ability to make a community of anyone who loves to read and who is compelled to write.' She added: 'Through literature, we experience life through another's eyes, we are comforted, strengthened. We laugh, we cry, we travel to different lands, and we escape the real world. 'In short, books, and those who create them, make life better, much better – so thank you. We see firsthand the impact stories have on how we understand and articulate the world both as we find it, and as we dream it to be.' The Reading Room reaches 12 million people across 173 countries through its reading advocacy which includes a podcast, research initiatives, and an annual literary festival drawing tens of thousands of visitors. Honouring the UK's 'reading heroes', the Medal hopes to 'recognise those individuals championing books and storytelling in their communities'. Nominees will include people who have set up community reading groups, improved access to local libraries, donated books to those in need, or organised local literary festivals. Applications for the accolade will open on 1 April, with the first award winners to be announced in March 2026. 'We passionately believe that books are for everyone, and we want to try and get as many people engaged in reading whether its a beach read or the latest title, it really doesn't matter, it's about engaging in stories,' CEO Vicky Perrin told The Independent. Sharing her support for the Medal, Alien actor Weaver told The Independent: 'I can't imagine my life without books. What the Queen has done started so small, but it's taken off because people need books now more than ever.' Bridgerton actor Andoh, who also works closely with the King's Trust and is a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature said: 'We are losing access to libraries and the Queen has created a great community encouraging reading across the world.' Margolyes echoed the other stars saying that the source of hatred and division was a lack of empathy and reading books could be a much-needed salve. 'Reading allows us to inhabit another world, and see things through other people's eyes,' she said. There was also a display marking the 250th anniversary of the birth of Jane Austen, featuring rare items from Austen's House and the Royal Collection Trust. The Queen said her current Reading Room recommendation was Sense And Sensibility, Austen's first, anonymously published novel.
Express Tribune
25-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Express Tribune
The university as monster
What makes a university monstrous? It isn't just the presence of dark academia aesthetics or secret societies. It isn't a haunted library or a forbidden manuscript. The true horror lies in the institution itselfthe way it selects, indoctrinates, exploits, and ultimately consumes. There's something inherently unsettling about the university. It dangles the promise of knowledge but demands submission. It cultivates intellect while reinforcing hierarchy. It sells the illusion of transformation, yet leaves its mark on those who pass through, moulding them into what it needs - or discarding them when they fail to serve. Literature often portrays universities as spaces of metamorphosis, places where the self is unmade and remade. But what if the university itself is not just a backdrop, not just an old house with shadowed corridors, but a living thing, a force with its own hunger? These four books don't just frame the university as a haunted mansion filled with academic ghosts. They treat it as something far more insidious: a system that tightens around its inhabitants, shaping them, consuming them, and sometimes, spitting them out. 1. 'The Secret History' There are no flickering candles or grand, crumbling ruins in The Secret History. No restless spirits haunt the halls of Hampden College. But the university in Donna Tartt's 1992 debut novel is less a setting than it is a force, an intelligence that selects, indoctrinates, and ultimately destroys. Richard Papen arrives at Hampden College, drawn to an elite Greek studies program led by the elusive Julian Morrow. What follows is an initiation into a way of thinking so insular, so intoxicating, that reality itself begins to bend. Under Julian's tutelage, Richard is welcomed into an esoteric circle of students - brilliant, aristocratic, and strangely removed from the rest of the college. They speak in ancient tongues, dress with a studied elegance, and move through the world with an unsettling detachment, as if they belong to another time entirely. Yet beneath the cultivated charm of their world lies something darker. The further Richard is drawn in, the more he begins to sense a quiet, almost imperceptible dread. Whispers of something unspeakable lurking beneath their perfect compositions and hushed laughter. Hampden's idyllic veneer cracks, revealing a place where knowledge is not merely power but a temptation, a narcotic, and, for some, a death sentence. 2. 'Babel, or the Necessity of Violence' If Hampden seduces, then the Oxford of this 2022 novel by RF Kuang is openly, unapologetically monstrous. Here, the university is not simply complicit in colonial power. It is the engine that drives it. Robin Swift, a Chinese orphan raised in England, enters Babel, Oxford's prestigious translation institute, believing in its promise of scholarship and belonging. But he quickly learns that the university extracts language and refines knowledge into a form of magic that fuels British imperialism. Robin and his fellow students are not being educated so much as they are being consumed, valued for their linguistic talents, but never truly allowed to belong. Unlike The Secret History, where the characters' downfall is largely of their own making, Babel makes it clear that the university's hunger is systemic. Far from allowing, it demands destruction. Those who recognise the monster for what it is must choose between complicity and rebellion, at great personal cost. 3. 'The Library at Mount Char' At first glance, this 2015 novel by Scott Hawkins doesn't seem to belong on this list. Its nightmarish Library is not a university in any traditional sense. But in this world, learning is indistinguishable from suffering. The Library is ruled by a godlike figure known as Father, who takes in twelve orphans and subjects them to brutal, specialised training in arcane knowledge. Each child is assigned a "catalogue" a single domain of expertise - and mastery comes at the cost of everything else. This is an education that goes a step above expanding young minds as it rewires them, hollowing out their humanity in service of something larger and more terrifying. Hawkins takes the metaphor of academia as a devouring force to its extreme. Here, knowledge erases, instead of enlightening and the pursuit of mastery is indistinguishable from obliteration. 4. 'Piranesi' Unlike the other books on this list, Susanna Clarke's 2020 novel does not immediately present itself as a critique of academia. It unfolds in an endless, labyrinthine House, where the protagonist, dubbed Piranesi, wanders, documenting his days in careful journals. At first, the House seems to exist beyond time, a world of statues and tides, quiet and infinite. But as the novel progresses, the true horror reveals itself. Ultimately, the House is the byproduct of academic obsession. Throw in the haunting figure of the Other, a visitor who intermittently enters the plot with gifts and wisdom. At its heart, Piranesi is a pursuit of knowledge that has long since abandoned its humanity. Clarke's novel turns the traditional academic journey inside out. In Piranesi, the true scholar is not the one who hoards knowledge, but the one who learns to live within it, to see it as something wondrous rather than something to be conquered. But by the time this realisation comes, the damage has already been done.
The Guardian
13-02-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Somebody Down There Likes Me by Robert Lukins review – a dispiriting imitation of Succession
Last week, the folks at Simon & Schuster in the US announced that they are no longer requiring their authors to scrounge and grovel for blurb quotes from literary luminaries (AKA friends, frenemies and coerced idols). Down with nepotism and unpaid labour! Up with democratic dust jackets! Begone hyperbole! Dazzling. Luminous. Tour de force. Good riddance to you all, you florid, empty guff. While we're at it, I'd like to request another puffery-related moratorium: can we please, for the love of dark academia, stop comparing novels to Donna Tartt's The Secret History? And not only for the sake of readers, who will inevitably be disappointed, but for the writers whose work is nobbled by the comparison. Tartt's bacchanalian debut was a literary lightning bolt. Let's just accept that it won't strike twice. The latest author to fall victim to the Tartt curse is Robert Lukins, whose third novel, Somebody Down There Likes Me, is set in Connecticut and includes a character called Mouse (missing, presumed dead). The Secret History was set in Vermont, and included a character called Bunny (dead, presumed missing). Here endeth the grand similarity: WASP nests and furry nicknames. The comparison does Lukins absolutely no favours (for starters, he has not written a campus novel – surely the threshold requirement). Somebody Down There Likes Me has also been likened to the HBO television series Succession, which is far more apt. A little too apt. Although it's set in 1996 – a tale of analog plutocrats – Lukins's new book feels dispiritingly imitative. The cultural bandwagon is passing, and this novel is hitching a ride. Meet the Gulch family: a clan of blunt force metaphors and late-capitalist tropes. There's addle-brained Fax Gulch, the source of the family money (largely obsolete). His ruthless wife, Honey, is the brains of the operation (she knows how to catch flies). Their insufferable son Lincoln: a 'gold-plated bad boy' and proto tech-bro ('I'm a block of blunt iron but I am going to hone myself into a blade'). And their estranged daughter Kick, who is the only one of the bunch with any kind of moral fight in her (echoes of Succession's Shiv, if mostly in name). Sign up for the fun stuff with our rundown of must-reads, pop culture and tips for the weekend, every Saturday morning The word gulch is a synonym for chasm, and also for a ravenous gulp. This is a story of both: ethical ravines and insatiable greed; a prequel for our self-satirising Trumpian present. (Fax built his fortune with $999,999 and 'would become a millionaire under his own steam'.) It begins with the end in sight: Honey has received word via her pet FBI informant that the Gulch empire is about to fall. And so she gathers the family together, coaxing Kick back home for the first time in a decade, to share the news and prepare to be unified in the face of public disgrace. Or at least that's the official plan. A reckoning is brewing, as reckonings are want to do. Have Honey and Fax cooked the books, enslaved a vast workforce of children, or vanished a whistleblower or two? We'll never know the details of their corporate sins. 'We've made some mistakes that are going to be judged illegal,' Fax explains to his kids, who ask no follow-up questions. What we know is that Honey does not consider them to be mistakes: 'There was no useful difference between the business of a criminal and non-criminal nature,' she thinks to herself. 'The two were as Good and Bad as each other, in that they were neither.' Perhaps – like the shark in Jaws – Lukins thinks that the lurking monster is more potent than the reveal. It's certainly not hard to fill in the gaps ourselves. We have plenty of examples: dynasty after rotten-hearted dynasty. But there's something lazy – rather than pointed – about the vagueness in Somebody Down There Likes Me. Cultural shorthand, not cultural critique. That feeling only intensifies over the course of the Gulch family's last interminable week together as they sneer and scheme and float in the indoor pool (in place of Chekhov's gun, we have Gatsby's swimming pool). Mostly they chew on the cud of their psyches like indolent, Wagyu cows, masticating on their secrets – such as the fate of missing Mouse (the girl who roared). Sign up to Saved for Later Catch up on the fun stuff with Guardian Australia's culture and lifestyle rundown of pop culture, trends and tips after newsletter promotion It's all very Bonfizzle of the Vanities. And that's the true mystery of this novel. Plenty of writers have been here before: Fitzgerald, Cheever, Updike, Wolfe, Yates, Ford, Roth, Easton-Ellis, Franzen (and that's just the great American dick-swingers). Why Lukins seems so intent on joining their company – retreading this compacted ground – is hard to fathom. It's a dispiriting swerve, for Lukins is capable of extraordinary quiet and grace (see his gorgeous 2018 debut, The Everlasting Sunday). But here is yet another trendy tale of feckless, all-American cruelty: Kieran Culkin outtakes with a soundtrack by Lana Del Rey. If cashed-up spite is what Lukins really wants, there's an abundance in his own back yard. Imagine if this novel was set in the red dust of iron ore country. Or aboard the champagne-tacky deck of the Australia-II. Or on a dinosaur-infested golf course. Imagine what we might learn about our own national psyche if we chewed on that instead. Somebody Down There Likes Me by Robert Lukins is published by Allen & Unwin
