Alumna Joanna Miller Releases Debut Novel, ‘The Eights’

The Eights is set in Oxford in 1920, and the story follows four young women - Dora, Beatrice, Otto and Marianne - who arrive as part of the first cohort of female students to be formally admitted to the University. Coming from all walks of life, they share neighbouring rooms on Corridor Eight and are thrown into an unlikely, life-affirming friendship. Together they navigate life a city still shaped by war, tradition, and inequality.

The inspiration for the book came from University of Oxford social media post in 2020, which marked one hundred years since women were admitted to study for degrees. “The images were grainy and the faces solemn,” Joanna remembers, “but I instantly wanted to know who these pioneering women were, and what hurdles they had faced to get there. At the time, I was reading a book about the cadets that lived and trained in my town during World War One. I wondered if I could combine these two ideas: what if a cadet fell in love with a local girl and encouraged her to go to Oxford?”

While writing The Eights, Joanna returned to Oxford to carry out research. “The Bodleian Library kindly renewed my card after thirty years,” she says, “allowing me to access hundreds of documents relating to the first women students. I even stayed overnight at St Hugh’s College (where the story is set) and got to read firsthand accounts by students from the 1920s.”

While writing the book, Joanna was conscious of the need to reflect the real challenges women faced at the time. “Oxford’s first women students were thrown out of lectures, mocked, refused entry to societies, and punished for fraternising with men without chaperones,” she says. “It wasn’t an easy start.”

The Eights has so far been well-received, being described by Joanna Quinn, author of The Whalebone Theatre, as “a heartfelt, thoughtful and engaging book” and by Tracy Chevalier as “entertaining and moving”.