The Adjunct

“Entertaining, provocative … The Adjunct is a ripped-from-the-headlines dispatch from the front lines of the campus wars … both satirically absurd and sadly realistic.” —Brooklyn Rail
“The Adjunct feels like a unicorn, a truly thought-provoking look at power and misconduct—with a case so knotty, even the people involved are still untangling it—told from a POV rarely included in books set among quads and ivy-covered libraries.” —Bustle, Best New Books of March
“This novel is a tense yet witty exploration of the ups and (mostly) downs of adjunct life at the most elite colleges; it will open up discussions about labor rights, institutional stratification, and academia on the whole… . Adelmann provides impeccably written prose.” —Glamour, “Best Books for Book Clubs in 2026”
“The Adjunct turns an unflinching eye on academic precarity… . Adelmann’s sharply observed prose captures the claustrophobia of intellectual labor and the subtle violence of being underestimated.” —BookTrib
“A darkly funny, deeply incisive exploration of academia’s underbelly. Through Sam’s eyes, [Adelmann] exposes the absurd hierarchies and quiet humiliations of academic life with biting wit and emotional precision. Both a campus novel and a social reckoning, The Adjunct holds up an unflinching mirror to the systems that exploit passion in the name of prestige.” —Booklist

“This exposé of academia from the perspective of its most vulnerable residents offers a vital message at a time when it’s easy to forget what’s supposed to be at the center of all institutions: people—messy, unpredictable, and filled with fragile hope. A crucial new take on the time-honored tradition of the Campus Novel.” —Kirkus Reviews
“A slashing tale of academia’s exploitative gig economy and the aftermath of the #MeToo movement … Adelmann takes an unsparing and witty view of academia’s ‘pyramid scheme’ … This clever campus novel mischievously inverts John Williams’s Stoner.” —Publishers Weekly

“The status inequities and power dynamics in academia are put on full display in a bleak but satirical way, spotlighting how academia exploits adjunct labor and the seemingly impossible game of catch-up that tenure-track hopefuls are forced to play. Adelmann prompts exploration about who has the power or right to control a public narrative that is eerily apt in the current social climate.” —Library Journal
“Turns the campus novel on its head … a blistering examination of the gig economy at work in higher education.” —BookPage

“Adelmann’s frank, sometimes darkly funny novel is a revealing depiction of the professional and personal challenges facing a young adjunct English professor.” —Shelf Awareness
“Maria Adelmann takes the campus novel to new, jittery, and visceral places with The Adjunct. This darkly comic novel is anxiety-provoking in the best of ways as it explodes the seamy guts of the academy, unravels the fabric of MeToo, and bursts the mystique of authorial intent. Adelmann’s titular adjunct, Sam, feels so real that I bit my cheeks to shreds as her life implodes over and over until the jaw-dropping end. Beyond the visceral reading experience, I have to applaud the novel’s craft, the cochlear structure that whirls in upon itself, only to finish in an open space. I loved the literary doubling, the mille-feuille of textual references, and the constant, inescapable thrum of late-stage capitalism.” —Chelsea G. Summers, author of A Certain Hunger
“A good writer might have a stance on some of the important issues of their time; a great writer will push the conversation further, as Maria Adelmann has done with The Adjunct. It’s an outrageous, smart novel about the rat race of academia, the MeToo movement, and debt from a writer whose masterful sleight of hand is saying the quiet parts loud, who is not afraid to sit in the uncomfortable gray space—and to paint it with even more hues. Conversational yet piercing, this is a powerful portrait of a woman in dire circumstances. This book has bite and one of the most damning endings I’ve ever read. I’m obsessed.” —Katie Yee, author of Maggie; or, a Man and a Woman Walk into a Bar
“Disarmingly deft, surprisingly suspenseful, and full of delicious rage and language play. I have been waiting a long time for this satisfying novel about the crumbling of academia and the truth-warping storm of labor exploitation and intellectual grifting it leaves behind. A stay-up-all-night page-turner and a burning indictment of the creative class’s addictions and fantasies. I inhaled this book.” —Emma Copley Eisenberg, author of Housemates and Fat Swim

Maria Adelmann is the award-winning author of the story collection Girls of a Certain Age and the novel How to Be Eaten, an NPR book of the year and Belletrist book club pick.

She has written for The New York Times, Tin House, n+1, Electric Literature, McSweeney’s, and many other publications. Her work has been distinguished by The Best American Short Stories.

Adelmann has lived in Baltimore and Copenhagen and now resides in Philadelphia.

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