Akemi C. Brodsky is the author of The Brill Pill. She graduated magna cum laude from Brown University with a bachelor of science, then moved to the UK to do a master’s in engineering at Imperial College London. She currently lives in the Bay Area and spends most of her spare time traveling, cooking, seeing family and friends, and watching TV.
At Tor.com Brodsky tagged five academic novels that won’t make you want to return to school, including:
The Name of the Wind by Patrick RothfussRead about another entry on the list.
This is a controversial pick because I have heard some people say that they would love to attend the University. Personally, there are a few too many public floggings for me to voluntarily enroll. Kvothe, on the other hand, is desperate tobe allowed in. Spurred by unspeakable tragedy and scrambling from a life of destitution, he is fueled by a need for knowledge, a thirst for vengeance, and his own extraordinary aptitude. School for Kvothe is fundamental but for others it is grueling. The unremitting pressure lands some few hundred students in an asylum known familiarly as the ‘Crockery.’ Though the ‘Crockery’ is fiction, the mental strain of college can be all too real, and for those of us not who are not ridiculously good at, well, everything, the idea of going back is less than appealing. That said, the story begins at some point in the future, where Kvothe is apparently no more than a humble innkeeper, laying low under a false name. A beautifully slow roll into a world of satisfyingly academic magic, The Name of the Wind is a fascinating character study that will leave you needing more (not least because the third part of the trilogy has yet to be released).
The Name of the Wind (Kingkiller Chronicles Series #1) is among Meghan Ball's eleven top fictional bands in sci-fi & fantasy and ten top fictional educational institutions from SFF books, and Arwen Elys Dayton's five top books about false identities.
My Book, The Movie: The Name of the Wind.
--Marshal Zeringue
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