Ghosts of Harvard

May 4, 2020
Serritella debuts with a brisk, entertaining coming-of-age story about a young woman trying simultaneously to find out who she is and uncover the truth about her brother’s death. Cady Archer begins her studies at Harvard University less than a year after the death of her older brother, Eric, a Harvard student and the golden child of the family whose schizophrenia has long been a source of trouble in Cady’s life. She and her parents have been devastated by his suicide, and now Cady wants to know what happened and what her brother’s life was like at Harvard. Using one of Eric’s cryptic notebooks like a treasure map, Cady wanders the campus and talks with Nikos, her brother’s friend, and Mikaela Prokop, his faculty advisor, who explain how he stopped taking medication as he became increasingly dedicated to his physics research on entanglement theory. Her desire for resolution also sparks an interest in geocaching (scavenger hunts based on GPS locating) and she begins to hear voices: first, one that helps her out in a history class; and then one that helps her escape a rapist. Serritella has a wonderful touch for her secondary characters—there’s a Professor Hines who is a note-perfect caricature of a tenured Harvard professor—and Cady herself has a great voice. Readers of campus mysteries will love this surprising and intricate bildungsroman.

This audiobook is not what it seems, and its unpredictable twists make Francesca Serritella's mystery worth listening to. The story focuses on Cady Archer, a Harvard freshman dealing with the emotional baggage of her brother's suicide who begins to hear multiple voices--not just any voices, but voices whose existence is tied to her new school. Listeners will appreciate Karissa Vacker's fine performance as she inhabits Cady and conveys her emotions as each voice speaks and attempts to torment and control her. But all is never as it seems, and Vacker's ability to use nuanced tones and a varied pace to handle those moments allows listeners to share Cady's journey, and the ultimate resolution of her conflicted psyche. D.J.S. � AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine