"Higher Magic is my catnip. By what dark arts I know not, Floyd has summoned up a wonderful wizard-grad-school slice-of-life, replete with organizing, romance, anxiety, camaraderie, and courage. More please!" —Max Gladstone, NYT Bestselling Co-Author of This is How You Lose the Time War
In this incisive, irreverent, and whimsical cozy dark academia novel for fans of Heather Fawcett’s Emily Wilde series and R.F. Kuang'''s Babel, a struggling mage student with intense anxiety must prove that classic literature contained magic—and learn to wield her own stories to change her institution for the better.
First-generation graduate student Dorothe Bartleby has one last chance to pass the Magic program’s qualifying exam after freezing with anxiety during her first attempt. If she fails to demonstrate that magic in classic literature changed the world, she’ll be kicked out of the university. And now her advisor insists she reframe her entire dissertation using Digimancy. While mages have found a way to combine computers and magic, Bartleby’s fated to never make it work.
This time is no exception. Her revised working goes horribly wrong, creating a talking skull named Anne that narrates Bartleby’s inner thoughts—even the most embarrassing ones—like she's a heroine in a Jane Austen novel. Out of her depth, she recruits James, an unfairly attractive mage candidate, to help her stop Anne’s glitches in time for her exam.
Instead, Anne leads them to a shocking and dangerous discovery: Magic students who seek disability accommodations are disappearing—quite literally. When the administration fails to act, Bartleby must learn to trust her own knowledge and skills. Otherwise, she risks losing both the missing students and her future as a mage, permanently.
Genre: Fantasy
In this incisive, irreverent, and whimsical cozy dark academia novel for fans of Heather Fawcett’s Emily Wilde series and R.F. Kuang'''s Babel, a struggling mage student with intense anxiety must prove that classic literature contained magic—and learn to wield her own stories to change her institution for the better.
First-generation graduate student Dorothe Bartleby has one last chance to pass the Magic program’s qualifying exam after freezing with anxiety during her first attempt. If she fails to demonstrate that magic in classic literature changed the world, she’ll be kicked out of the university. And now her advisor insists she reframe her entire dissertation using Digimancy. While mages have found a way to combine computers and magic, Bartleby’s fated to never make it work.
This time is no exception. Her revised working goes horribly wrong, creating a talking skull named Anne that narrates Bartleby’s inner thoughts—even the most embarrassing ones—like she's a heroine in a Jane Austen novel. Out of her depth, she recruits James, an unfairly attractive mage candidate, to help her stop Anne’s glitches in time for her exam.
Instead, Anne leads them to a shocking and dangerous discovery: Magic students who seek disability accommodations are disappearing—quite literally. When the administration fails to act, Bartleby must learn to trust her own knowledge and skills. Otherwise, she risks losing both the missing students and her future as a mage, permanently.
Genre: Fantasy
Praise for this book
"Higher Magic is enchanting, affirming, and an astonishingly realistic representation of my own experience in grad school (which is a delightful thing to say about a book that also features a most loquacious narration skull). Courtney Floyd's intelligent, inclusive novel captures the challenges of navigating academia as a disabled person...while ultimately celebrating the bravery of living and learning in spite of an oppressive system." - Sylvie Cathrall
"Higher Magic is my catnip. By what dark arts I know not, Floyd has summoned up a wonderful wizard-grad-school slice-of-life, replete with organizing, romance, anxiety, camaraderie, and courage. More please!" - Max Gladstone
"Higher Magic is the subversive, dry-humored, disability justice-oriented dark academia book of my heart. Between the truly ingenious magic system, potent renderings of grad school trauma (and community!), an edge-of-your-seat mystery, and a romance that had me cackling, I couldn't put this book down. Actual witchcraft." - P H Low
"A brilliant celebration of friendship, education, and refusal to surrender in the face of injustice, all set in a magical university that anyone who has ever battled through the joys and torments of postgraduate study will find hauntingly familiar. Witty, compassionate, and fiercely intelligent." - H G Parry
"An outrageously original magic system, real and relatable characters, themes of belonging, self-determination, and community, A+ romance, and some of the best disability representation I've read - not to mention the charming talking skull - make this an entrancing page-turner." - Leanne Schwartz
"Timely, twisty and immensely clever, Higher Magic is both a love letter to the written word and a rallying cry for the disenfranchised." - Frances White
"Higher Magic is my catnip. By what dark arts I know not, Floyd has summoned up a wonderful wizard-grad-school slice-of-life, replete with organizing, romance, anxiety, camaraderie, and courage. More please!" - Max Gladstone
"Higher Magic is the subversive, dry-humored, disability justice-oriented dark academia book of my heart. Between the truly ingenious magic system, potent renderings of grad school trauma (and community!), an edge-of-your-seat mystery, and a romance that had me cackling, I couldn't put this book down. Actual witchcraft." - P H Low
"A brilliant celebration of friendship, education, and refusal to surrender in the face of injustice, all set in a magical university that anyone who has ever battled through the joys and torments of postgraduate study will find hauntingly familiar. Witty, compassionate, and fiercely intelligent." - H G Parry
"An outrageously original magic system, real and relatable characters, themes of belonging, self-determination, and community, A+ romance, and some of the best disability representation I've read - not to mention the charming talking skull - make this an entrancing page-turner." - Leanne Schwartz
"Timely, twisty and immensely clever, Higher Magic is both a love letter to the written word and a rallying cry for the disenfranchised." - Frances White
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