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Miss Oliver's School for Girls #3
The Encampment
Honored by Kirkus Reviews as one of The Best Indie Books of 2020. "Davenport is an accomplished stylist with a keen ear for nuanced dialogue; he also has a knack for making serious political points with a light touch that makes them broadly accessible. . . A thoughtful and compelling account of the responsibilities that come with privilege."
-- Kirkus Reviews , Starred Review There are only two rules at Miss Oliver's School for Girls that lead to automatic stealing, and permitting a male who is not a family member into a dormitory. The head of school's daughter has broken both. Trouble approaches on a warm September day when Sylvia Perrine Bickham, the head of school's daughter, gives money to a homeless man on the street. Through some prying, she and her friends learn he is a veteran of the Iraq War and probably suffering from post-traumatic stress, so they sneak food and clothing to his lean-to at odd hours of the day and agree to tell no one―not the teachers, and especially not Sylvia's mother, Rachel. But talk of things gone missing from the school is getting louder, and Rachel knows something is up. More importantly, winter is coming and Sylvia worries the man will freeze if he stays outside. Have they done all they can for him? Have they done enough? What is enough. Vivid, riveting, and utterly engrossing, The Encampment is the third installment of the Miss Oliver's School for Girls series.
-- Kirkus Reviews , Starred Review There are only two rules at Miss Oliver's School for Girls that lead to automatic stealing, and permitting a male who is not a family member into a dormitory. The head of school's daughter has broken both. Trouble approaches on a warm September day when Sylvia Perrine Bickham, the head of school's daughter, gives money to a homeless man on the street. Through some prying, she and her friends learn he is a veteran of the Iraq War and probably suffering from post-traumatic stress, so they sneak food and clothing to his lean-to at odd hours of the day and agree to tell no one―not the teachers, and especially not Sylvia's mother, Rachel. But talk of things gone missing from the school is getting louder, and Rachel knows something is up. More importantly, winter is coming and Sylvia worries the man will freeze if he stays outside. Have they done all they can for him? Have they done enough? What is enough. Vivid, riveting, and utterly engrossing, The Encampment is the third installment of the Miss Oliver's School for Girls series.
- GenresFiction
316 pages, Hardcover
Published June 9, 2020
About the author
Stephen Davenport
9 books40 followersMy first full-time job, after graduating from college and then spending two years in the Navy as the Korean War wound down, was as a Wall Street banker. I chose that work because my wife and I wanted to live in NYC and go to theater as often as we could afford, and also because it was an acceptable screen for a young privileged WASP to hide behind while I wrote the Great American Novel.
By staying up late every night, I managed to produce the most self-indulgent, sophomoric novel every written – except perhaps by people who were actually still sophomores –and I mean in high school! Somehow, it managed to get the attention of an editor at Doubleday who wrote me a few pages on how I might rewrite it to make it publishable. I wasn’t sure whether he was sincere, or rewarding my wife, who worked at Doubleday, for doing her boss’s work in the afternoons while he recuperated from his lunch composed exclusively of martinis. At any rate, I started to rewrite, and soon found I could not. In the time it took to compose the novel, I had outgrown its premise entirely. So I buried the manuscript under the shirts in my bottom bureau drawer and decided to take some time off from my writing to catch up on my sleep.
But I couldn’t sleep. Because now, without the novel to think about, I thought about how ardently I didn’t want to get up in the morning and spend the whole day pretending to be a banker. I would have been less troubled if my act were not successful, but everyone at the bank, including several enthusiastic mentors, thought I had chosen my career. I was amazed that no one caught me out. I would have confessed: this is not me, but that didn’t happen, and I was soon promoted to the next rung up on the young executive’s ladder. My parents were delighted and relieved. Their son was climbing upwards along an acceptable path. But my college friends, when I told them I was a banker, either laughed, thinking I was joking, or looked concerned. Soon I’d own a house in the suburbs, take the train to the City every morning, reading the Wall Street Journal, like a character in a story by John Cheever. A perfectly fine life for some, but not for me. I felt trapped, powerless, parading through life in someone else’s identity, and vaguely suicidal. Inside New York’s tall buildings, I didn’t go near the windows.
I started perusing employment advertising in The New York Times, and happened upon one for a teacher of English and coach of football, basketball and track at a boarding school. I loved literature. I loved sports. So I applied. The position had come open too close to the beginning of the academic year for the school to have time to interview more than a very few candidates. That’s why I got the job. It was one of the luckiest days of my life.
For the next thirty years, except for a short spate of free-lance journalism in which I was lucky enough to place articles in the New York Times Magazine about conservation and an article in The Saturday Review on how African-American boys and girls were faring in elite private schools, I didn’t write. I didn’t have the emotional energy left over, let alone the time, to make up characters and vicariously live their lives, as a novelist must. I found that purveying to the still supple hearts of teenagers my passion for literature was all the satisfaction I needed–which is not to say that it was easy, nor that I was always successful. I loved the idiosyncratic cultures in which I worked and which I ultimately led as Head of School. It was easy to always try to do one’s best. How much success or failure was mine was for others to say, but I never had to ask, nor did my colleagues, Why am I doing this?
And besides, I never had to wear a suit!
I spent three years teaching English and coaching sports at Trinity-Pawling School, an all-boys boarding school in Pawling, NY; then thirteen years doing the same work at Kingswood-Oxford School, in West Hartford, CT, where I was privileged to have br
By staying up late every night, I managed to produce the most self-indulgent, sophomoric novel every written – except perhaps by people who were actually still sophomores –and I mean in high school! Somehow, it managed to get the attention of an editor at Doubleday who wrote me a few pages on how I might rewrite it to make it publishable. I wasn’t sure whether he was sincere, or rewarding my wife, who worked at Doubleday, for doing her boss’s work in the afternoons while he recuperated from his lunch composed exclusively of martinis. At any rate, I started to rewrite, and soon found I could not. In the time it took to compose the novel, I had outgrown its premise entirely. So I buried the manuscript under the shirts in my bottom bureau drawer and decided to take some time off from my writing to catch up on my sleep.
But I couldn’t sleep. Because now, without the novel to think about, I thought about how ardently I didn’t want to get up in the morning and spend the whole day pretending to be a banker. I would have been less troubled if my act were not successful, but everyone at the bank, including several enthusiastic mentors, thought I had chosen my career. I was amazed that no one caught me out. I would have confessed: this is not me, but that didn’t happen, and I was soon promoted to the next rung up on the young executive’s ladder. My parents were delighted and relieved. Their son was climbing upwards along an acceptable path. But my college friends, when I told them I was a banker, either laughed, thinking I was joking, or looked concerned. Soon I’d own a house in the suburbs, take the train to the City every morning, reading the Wall Street Journal, like a character in a story by John Cheever. A perfectly fine life for some, but not for me. I felt trapped, powerless, parading through life in someone else’s identity, and vaguely suicidal. Inside New York’s tall buildings, I didn’t go near the windows.
I started perusing employment advertising in The New York Times, and happened upon one for a teacher of English and coach of football, basketball and track at a boarding school. I loved literature. I loved sports. So I applied. The position had come open too close to the beginning of the academic year for the school to have time to interview more than a very few candidates. That’s why I got the job. It was one of the luckiest days of my life.
For the next thirty years, except for a short spate of free-lance journalism in which I was lucky enough to place articles in the New York Times Magazine about conservation and an article in The Saturday Review on how African-American boys and girls were faring in elite private schools, I didn’t write. I didn’t have the emotional energy left over, let alone the time, to make up characters and vicariously live their lives, as a novelist must. I found that purveying to the still supple hearts of teenagers my passion for literature was all the satisfaction I needed–which is not to say that it was easy, nor that I was always successful. I loved the idiosyncratic cultures in which I worked and which I ultimately led as Head of School. It was easy to always try to do one’s best. How much success or failure was mine was for others to say, but I never had to ask, nor did my colleagues, Why am I doing this?
And besides, I never had to wear a suit!
I spent three years teaching English and coaching sports at Trinity-Pawling School, an all-boys boarding school in Pawling, NY; then thirteen years doing the same work at Kingswood-Oxford School, in West Hartford, CT, where I was privileged to have br
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
October 10, 2020
THE ENCAMPMENT is about two worlds colliding: the pristine world of an upper-crust, private girl’s high school and the world of a recently-returned soldier suffering from PTSD. The question is, will two girls break the rules of the private high school to save a man’s life?
Sylvia and Elizabeth, two seniors, the first the daughter of the headmistress, go into town one weekend to get ice cream not because they’re hungry but because they have nothing better to do. After 12 years of privileged education, having completed each task set before her, Sylvia wonders, “Is this all there is?” Begging for money outside the ice cream parlor is a middle-aged, bedraggled man. So begins a chance encounter that will change all of their lives.
At first, Sylvia and Elizabeth treat the ex-Marine-sergeant, Christopher, as a privileged person does a stray dog—the girls give him scraps: a few dollar bills. But over time, the girls start to wonder about him. How can a man who has served four tours in Iraq live in poverty on the grounds of a school that charges tens of thousands of dollars to attend each year? Should the privileged bear some responsibility? Then, when Sylvia is out for one of her marathon runs, she stumbles upon Christopher naked, bathing in the river. She is dumbstruck, thrilled, and scared. In his nakedness, he becomes more of a person to her. In the same vicinity, she discovers his encampment: a primitive shelter he’s constructed out of tightly-knit pine boughs on the school’s property. If she tells anyone, especially her mom, the police would chase Christopher off. Instead, Sylvia and Elizabeth take on a secret, deeper role in Christopher’s life by bringing him canned food and a grill. Then, as the brutal, Connecticut winter approaches, the girls decide to steal warm clothes and camping supplies from the school—an act that would get them expelled. And when careless boys destroy Christopher’s encampment and unwittingly sentence him to death by cold, Sylvia has to decide whether to up the ante and risk everything she’s worked for for the past 12 years, or let a man die. Can this high-priced school for privileged girls abandon what it considers “correct” to reinvent itself as a school that does what is conscionable?
Davenport does a great job bringing both worlds to life, really, two encampments because the school is its own little, secluded world, with its own set of rules and values. We wonder, as Davenport writes in one remarkable line, whether the school will live by the rules that express what it was, or grow the rules to express what it wants to be. In this collision of worlds, when the smallness of the world Sylvia has lived in becomes apparent to her, she gets the answer to her question, “Is this all there is?”
There is beautiful writing throughout. Davenport has a way of writing characters that express unconventional thoughts in the most compelling ways. The risk the girls put themselves in carries the dramatic tension through the novel. Davenport, an ex-teacher and headmaster himself, also sneaks in what it looks like to be a great teacher.
The characters are fully fleshed out. Sylvia is our way into the novel because she, like us, the readers, have no deep understanding of what it is to live with PTSD. Davenport writes incisively about PTSD and we learn along with Sylvia the sentence that PTSD exacts on people as we see Christopher struggle.
The world that we, the reader live in is like our own encampment with its sense of normality and rules. The novel is asking if we, like Sylvia, the privileged, would be brave enough to welcome these complicated individuals into our encampment or would we knock down their shelters and run like the teenage boys? “Is this all there is,” is a question Davenport poses for the reader. What makes life worth living? Staying comfortable in our cocooned, privileged life where we mostly take care of ourselves, or living bravely in a bigger world, seeing the humanity in all of us, and making a difference with others?
This is the third book of a trilogy but it very much stands on its own. It’s a treat. Read it.
Sylvia and Elizabeth, two seniors, the first the daughter of the headmistress, go into town one weekend to get ice cream not because they’re hungry but because they have nothing better to do. After 12 years of privileged education, having completed each task set before her, Sylvia wonders, “Is this all there is?” Begging for money outside the ice cream parlor is a middle-aged, bedraggled man. So begins a chance encounter that will change all of their lives.
At first, Sylvia and Elizabeth treat the ex-Marine-sergeant, Christopher, as a privileged person does a stray dog—the girls give him scraps: a few dollar bills. But over time, the girls start to wonder about him. How can a man who has served four tours in Iraq live in poverty on the grounds of a school that charges tens of thousands of dollars to attend each year? Should the privileged bear some responsibility? Then, when Sylvia is out for one of her marathon runs, she stumbles upon Christopher naked, bathing in the river. She is dumbstruck, thrilled, and scared. In his nakedness, he becomes more of a person to her. In the same vicinity, she discovers his encampment: a primitive shelter he’s constructed out of tightly-knit pine boughs on the school’s property. If she tells anyone, especially her mom, the police would chase Christopher off. Instead, Sylvia and Elizabeth take on a secret, deeper role in Christopher’s life by bringing him canned food and a grill. Then, as the brutal, Connecticut winter approaches, the girls decide to steal warm clothes and camping supplies from the school—an act that would get them expelled. And when careless boys destroy Christopher’s encampment and unwittingly sentence him to death by cold, Sylvia has to decide whether to up the ante and risk everything she’s worked for for the past 12 years, or let a man die. Can this high-priced school for privileged girls abandon what it considers “correct” to reinvent itself as a school that does what is conscionable?
Davenport does a great job bringing both worlds to life, really, two encampments because the school is its own little, secluded world, with its own set of rules and values. We wonder, as Davenport writes in one remarkable line, whether the school will live by the rules that express what it was, or grow the rules to express what it wants to be. In this collision of worlds, when the smallness of the world Sylvia has lived in becomes apparent to her, she gets the answer to her question, “Is this all there is?”
There is beautiful writing throughout. Davenport has a way of writing characters that express unconventional thoughts in the most compelling ways. The risk the girls put themselves in carries the dramatic tension through the novel. Davenport, an ex-teacher and headmaster himself, also sneaks in what it looks like to be a great teacher.
The characters are fully fleshed out. Sylvia is our way into the novel because she, like us, the readers, have no deep understanding of what it is to live with PTSD. Davenport writes incisively about PTSD and we learn along with Sylvia the sentence that PTSD exacts on people as we see Christopher struggle.
The world that we, the reader live in is like our own encampment with its sense of normality and rules. The novel is asking if we, like Sylvia, the privileged, would be brave enough to welcome these complicated individuals into our encampment or would we knock down their shelters and run like the teenage boys? “Is this all there is,” is a question Davenport poses for the reader. What makes life worth living? Staying comfortable in our cocooned, privileged life where we mostly take care of ourselves, or living bravely in a bigger world, seeing the humanity in all of us, and making a difference with others?
This is the third book of a trilogy but it very much stands on its own. It’s a treat. Read it.
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May 28, 2020This was book #3 of the series...and though I have no real problem reading out of order...I do believe that this is one series that begs to be read in order. It was difficult for me to understand why the girls, Sylvia and her friend did some of the things that they did...which I'm sure was developed in the first two books. At times I thought that Sylvia had a good heart when she gave the homeless vet money and other supplies…but then when she turned around and spied on him…stole to give him what she did...I began to have second thoughts. I actually liked the character of the homeless veteran the most of any of them. He was “real” in that he knew he had problems and was trying to the best of his limited abilities to work through them. I hate to give criticism of an authors writing since I have never written or published a book…but I read about 300 a year that other people write and publish so I can say what appeals to me and makes me want to read more. For me…there was just too much “unnecessary” text…I guess you could say it was “too wordy”…if that makes any sense. It was a good storyline, good plot, good enough for the 3.5 rating…but for me it was difficult.
I received a complimentary copy of this book from WestMargin Press in exchange for an honest opinion. The views expressed by this reviewer are entirely my own.
I received a complimentary copy of this book from WestMargin Press in exchange for an honest opinion. The views expressed by this reviewer are entirely my own.
June 2, 2020
The Encampment by Stephen Davenport
Sylvia is the Daughter of the head of a prestigious boarding School. She and her best friend Elizabeth encounter a homeless man (Christopher). They decide to help, bring him food, clothing and such. She is determined to help this man even if it means breaking the (school) rules. What they do not know is he is a Veteran of the Iraq war, suffering from PTSD.
A fast paced original story with an intriguing plot and well developed characters. Sylvia is curious, caring and often impulsive. Her Mother takes her job seriously and loves her Daughter. Christopher is very likable, he has been through so much. I wanted to see him achieve everything possible, achieve inner peace and live a good life.
Overall I found The Encampment enjoyable. Although this is book three in the series, I was able to understand what was happening. I would like to read the first two books, to get to know the characters a (bit) better. I recommend to Y/A as well as Adult Readers.
Sylvia is the Daughter of the head of a prestigious boarding School. She and her best friend Elizabeth encounter a homeless man (Christopher). They decide to help, bring him food, clothing and such. She is determined to help this man even if it means breaking the (school) rules. What they do not know is he is a Veteran of the Iraq war, suffering from PTSD.
A fast paced original story with an intriguing plot and well developed characters. Sylvia is curious, caring and often impulsive. Her Mother takes her job seriously and loves her Daughter. Christopher is very likable, he has been through so much. I wanted to see him achieve everything possible, achieve inner peace and live a good life.
Overall I found The Encampment enjoyable. Although this is book three in the series, I was able to understand what was happening. I would like to read the first two books, to get to know the characters a (bit) better. I recommend to Y/A as well as Adult Readers.
June 9, 2020
This book was pretty good. I didn't read books 1 & 2 however that didn't change the story. I'm wondering if there will be a book 4. I want to know more.
July 25, 2020
The Encampment, set in a prestigious New England boarding school for girls, is the story of what happens when two privileged seniors, one the daughter of the Head of School, set out to help a homeless Iraq war vet they discover camping on the rural school property. Before long Elizabeth and Sylvia learn that in their idealistic passion for rescuing Christopher, the vet, they may well be putting themselves in danger. For one thing, they’ve risked expulsion for stealing in order to supply him with food and clothing. As if this weren’t enough, as they spend more time with this shy, proud young man, they learn he suffers from PSTD, which periodically distorts his reality and brings on bouts of fear and rage.
Davenport, who had had a distinguished career in teaching and independent school administration, clearly knows his territory: both the trials and satisfactions of running a school and the idealism and impulsivity of the girls are rendered with precision and humor. He also writes vivid and convincing depictions of Christopher’s struggle to gain a hold on reality, including flashbacks to the war where he caused the death of a young girl during an IED event. All the major and minor characters are good people with flaws. The changes and conflicts in their lives are portrayed with tenderness and nuance. (I sometimes longed for a bit more villainy.)
Davenport raises a lot of questions about the responsibilities that come with privilege—the mission of the school is to empower young women, but empower them for what? This is a timely read, asking questions about race, class, economics and the very definition of education. But Davenport writes with a light touch, without preachiness. The characters and story are kept front and center, but he renders their moral conflicts in all their complexity. Obey the rules or do what’s right? Is Rachel, the school head, who by the way is Black, really going to expel her own daughter? Will the girls’ friendship survive the different choices they each make? Will Christopher make it if he comes in out of the cold and gets help?
This is the third in Davenport’s trilogy about Miss Oliver’s School for Girls, but it can be read as a standalone. Kirkus gave this a starred review.
Davenport, who had had a distinguished career in teaching and independent school administration, clearly knows his territory: both the trials and satisfactions of running a school and the idealism and impulsivity of the girls are rendered with precision and humor. He also writes vivid and convincing depictions of Christopher’s struggle to gain a hold on reality, including flashbacks to the war where he caused the death of a young girl during an IED event. All the major and minor characters are good people with flaws. The changes and conflicts in their lives are portrayed with tenderness and nuance. (I sometimes longed for a bit more villainy.)
Davenport raises a lot of questions about the responsibilities that come with privilege—the mission of the school is to empower young women, but empower them for what? This is a timely read, asking questions about race, class, economics and the very definition of education. But Davenport writes with a light touch, without preachiness. The characters and story are kept front and center, but he renders their moral conflicts in all their complexity. Obey the rules or do what’s right? Is Rachel, the school head, who by the way is Black, really going to expel her own daughter? Will the girls’ friendship survive the different choices they each make? Will Christopher make it if he comes in out of the cold and gets help?
This is the third in Davenport’s trilogy about Miss Oliver’s School for Girls, but it can be read as a standalone. Kirkus gave this a starred review.
December 11, 2020
I really enjoyed this book. I do recommend it and hope there will be another in this series! Recommend this read
December 19, 2025
The Encampment is a beautifully written and emotionally resonant story that captures the complexities of compassion, loyalty, and moral courage. Stephen Davenport has created a vivid and engaging world at Miss Oliver’s School for Girls, and the way he explores the ethical dilemmas faced by Sylvia Perrine Bickham and her friends is both thought-provoking and heartwarming.
The narrative effortlessly blends tension, empathy, and character development. The girls’ secret efforts to help a vulnerable veteran highlight not only the stakes involved but also the depth of their integrity and growth. The story is compelling, immersive, and leaves a lasting impression about the power of empathy and the choices we make when faced with real human need.
The narrative effortlessly blends tension, empathy, and character development. The girls’ secret efforts to help a vulnerable veteran highlight not only the stakes involved but also the depth of their integrity and growth. The story is compelling, immersive, and leaves a lasting impression about the power of empathy and the choices we make when faced with real human need.
June 3, 2020
Sylvia and her friend Elizabeth help a homeless man veteran; first with money then by stealing items from their boarding school. Sylvia’s mother is the head of said boarding school, so problems soon develop. Does Sylvia’s behavior have repercussions? Although, the third book in a series (I haven’t read the first two), this can be read as a standalone.
Christopher, the homeless vet is sympathetic and Silvia’s actions are noble, but I found the story to be slow and I couldn’t get into it as much as I wanted to.
Christopher, the homeless vet is sympathetic and Silvia’s actions are noble, but I found the story to be slow and I couldn’t get into it as much as I wanted to.
October 3, 2020
Review: Encampment by Stephen Davenport.
This was an Early Reviewers book that I enjoyed, found acceptable, good story line but a little stretched in areas. This was the third book in the series so maybe I could have had a little more information before I read this one. The book still kept me captivated and fascinated to keep reading. It was in a prestigious New England boarding school for girls. I wanted to find out what was going to happen to a homeless Iraq war veteran. He was a great character and the thoughtfulness of the girls helping this man was a good deed about their character but also risky in more than one way.
The homeless man was Christopher and the two girls who tried to help him were Elizabeth and Sylvia. Rachel is Sylvia’s mother and The Head person of the school and very strict. The girls put themselves in danger more than once being around the homeless man and in trouble with the rules of the school they broke. They could be expelled for stealing food and clothes and one cold night they sneaked him into the dorm to their room to help him from freezing outside.
At the time the girls were helping Christopher and realized as they spent more time with Christopher they discovered he had PSTD and would sometimes confuse reality which brought up fear and rage emotions in him. So, they were in danger even though Christopher was a nice person and what were they going to do if Sylvia’s mother found out?
This was an Early Reviewers book that I enjoyed, found acceptable, good story line but a little stretched in areas. This was the third book in the series so maybe I could have had a little more information before I read this one. The book still kept me captivated and fascinated to keep reading. It was in a prestigious New England boarding school for girls. I wanted to find out what was going to happen to a homeless Iraq war veteran. He was a great character and the thoughtfulness of the girls helping this man was a good deed about their character but also risky in more than one way.
The homeless man was Christopher and the two girls who tried to help him were Elizabeth and Sylvia. Rachel is Sylvia’s mother and The Head person of the school and very strict. The girls put themselves in danger more than once being around the homeless man and in trouble with the rules of the school they broke. They could be expelled for stealing food and clothes and one cold night they sneaked him into the dorm to their room to help him from freezing outside.
At the time the girls were helping Christopher and realized as they spent more time with Christopher they discovered he had PSTD and would sometimes confuse reality which brought up fear and rage emotions in him. So, they were in danger even though Christopher was a nice person and what were they going to do if Sylvia’s mother found out?
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews