If you loved the eerie, claustrophobic setting of Catherine House, you’ll be hooked by Bunny. Mona Awad crafts a surreal, gothic world inside an elite MFA program, where outsider Samantha is drawn into a bizarre clique of women. Like Ines’s journey through the strange rituals and secrets of Catherine House, you’ll find yourself questioning what’s real as Samantha’s reality slips. Awad’s academic setting is lush, menacing, and just as intoxicatingly weird.

The slow-building dread and deep psychological exploration in Catherine House is mirrored in Never Let Me Go. You’ll be drawn into Kathy’s memories of Hailsham, a school whose true purpose is gradually revealed, much like Ines’s slow realization of Catherine House’s secrets. Ishiguro’s quiet, haunting narrative delves into the students’ inner lives and emotional struggles, leaving you thinking long after the final page.

If what pulled you into Catherine House was Ines’s ambiguous morality and the cult-like allure of the school, The Secret History is your next obsession. Richard Papen is swept into an elite group at a secluded college, and together they commit acts that blur the line between right and wrong. Tartt’s winding psychological drama and morally complex characters evoke the same sense of complicity and unease.

If you loved the layered mysteries and dark academia vibes of Catherine House, Plain Bad Heroines will enchant you. Danforth weaves together the sinister past of a girls’ school with a present-day film adaptation, linking the fates of her characters across eras. The shifting timelines and interconnected stories build a complex, haunting atmosphere that’s perfect for fans of academic gothic fiction.

If you appreciated the gradual, atmospheric unfolding of Catherine House, you’ll be mesmerized by The Bellwether Revivals. Cambridge student Oscar is drawn into the enigmatic Bellwether family, where strange happenings and a sense of foreboding build slowly but inexorably. This novel masterfully sustains suspense, allowing you to savor the tension as secrets are revealed.