cover image That Book About Harvard

That Book About Harvard

Eric Kester. Sourcebooks, $14.99 trade paper (352p) ISBN 978-1-4022-6750-5

Just in time for graduation season, Kester, a writer for collegehumour.com, shares his hilarious and poignant misadventures during his often humiliating first year at Harvard. On day one, he locks himself out of his room in his Incredible Hulk boxers and makes a memorable walk across the grounds to get a key. Having gotten into the esteemed school thanks to his grades and also his skills on the football field, he feels pressure on two fronts and routinely inadequate at a university so intensely competitive that there are even grades for the annual campus streaking before finals. At one of his lowest points he’s contemplating not only the prospect of cheating on an exam but of also possibly failing a random drug test for the NCAA. Unable for hours to provide a sample in front of a witness, the tester eventually has to accompany Kester to class until he’s able to perform. Although he survives to see a second semester and gains some traction academically and socially, he’s felled by a broken heart. Depressed, the author considers quitting the football team and not returning to school. Like many other successful high school students, Kester struggles during freshman year with finding his identity, although with heightened anxieties that come with Ivy League admission. With self-deprecation and clear eyes, he deftly manages to dispel some of the Harvard mythos and his illusions as he learns to not take his achievements or himself so seriously (July)