Life’s a College—What’s Your Course?

Sleeping feet from strangers is not a description Cadence Cooper remembers from the brochure that brought her to Charlestowne College, but this jarring reality becomes one of many she encounters as a freshman. Threatened with expulsion from a “Demon of Darkness” professor and tormented by a hellacious roommate, Cadence struggles to survive in this realm of hookups and higher education. Here sex, drugs, and drinking become subjects of study just as much as coursework.

Just when she’s ready to give up the dream of a college degree, she finds romance with a rock star classmate and a position as a student photographer. With her lens focused on the campus and Charleston, a stunning city that teaches its own powerful lessons, Cadence uncovers the details of a devastating rape, a mysterious suicide, and a secret group intent on exposing a scandal that will forever change the school.

Knowledge never comes without cost—or surprises. Life with strangers transforms into profound experiences with friends, foes, lovers, and liars in and out of the Holy City’s classrooms. Cadence’s first-year journey begins with “English 101: The Composition of Life,” but where it ends shocks even her.