A Vanderbilt emeritus professor has written a novel set on campus.

“My main aim was to write a story about the difficulties faced by a young athlete in today's college and sports environment (in this case, the football environment) as he pursues both football and a quality education, competing in the classroom against non-football playing students,” says Len Alberstadt, professor of geology emeritus, about his recent novel Poncomma.

The novel is set at Vanderbilt because “I needed a private university that selects students for a rather strenuous academic adventure,” says Alberstadt. “At the same time it had to also be a member of a high-powered, demanding football conference.” Vanderbilt fit that bill, as well as being the university that Alberstadt was most familiar with.

In Poncomma, Delsin Cole, the only son of an Oklahoma rancher, is a talented high school football player recruited by almost every university in the country with a major football program. When he decides to forego all the schools with their "bigger than life" athletic notoriety to cast his lot with Vanderbilt University, almost everyone in his home town of Poncomma, Okla., is shocked and disappointed.

Poncomma is “a wonderfully complex and convoluted novel about families, education, politics, romance and football – and above all, about growing up” writes Westview Inc., the publisher.

Contact: Missy Pankake, (615) 322-NEWS
Missy.pankake@vanderbilt.edu