While most Oxford students might struggle to fit an evening at the pub around a week’s essay, Samantha Shannon is someone a little different.

In fact, think JK Rowling/ Philip Pullman different, as several national newspapers have been keen to stress.

And perhaps they’re not too far wide of the mark; you see, aside from finishing her degree in English Literature this year, the 21-year-old has also managed to write, publish and publicise her debut novel, The Bone Season, which comes out on Tuesday.

Plus, in the process, she has secured for herself another six-book deal and sold the rights to the series to Andy Serkis’ film company, The Imaginarium.

When I suggest that she might have chosen a slightly less gruelling path, she agrees to a point but emphasises practicality. “It was quite tough, yeah. I knew that I wanted to become a writer, but I knew that it wasn’t an industry that I could necessarily rely on to get a job, because a lot of it depends on luck.”

Set in an alternate-timeline future dystopia, The Bone Season follows the trials of Paige Mahoney, a powerful clairvoyant in a world where such abilities are punishable by death. Taken by force from her home in the oppressive regime of Scion London, Paige finds herself enslaved by a race of mysterious creatures called the Rephaim who live in a long-lost city that they call Sheol I, but may be more familiar to readers as Oxford itself.

Even setting aside her juggling of writing and degree, it’s clear that The Bone Season has been a labour of love for Samantha, taking many years and numerous rewrites. “I’m really picky with editing,” she explains. “I got to the point where the editing deadline was finished, and I kept saying to them ‘Oh no, I really need to change one more thing, and at one point I actually stopped the presses! I think my editors must have wanted to kill me by the end.” But her life and manuscript intact, Samantha’s novel comes out next week in a storm of publicity that many debut authors could only dream of.

However, just a few short years ago, Samantha was just another English student with aspirations towards creative writing. “Sheol I wasn’t even an idea in my head when I came to Oxford, it sort of developed,” Shannon attests, but it is clear that her time studying in the city influenced her portrayal of it in the novel in a number of ways; primarily, through familiarity. “When I got the idea for the book in 2011, I knew that by that point I knew Oxford quite well and I could change it as the book demanded.” However, Samantha also acknowledges that the city’s architecture was also a big factor. “I just felt that the size, and the timelessness of the buildings, were very helpful for me. There’s lots of cities which I feel really elicit that reaction, like York, or Cambridge, these cities that are still untouched, in many ways. For me Oxford was perfect in that respect for themes in the novel. They call it ‘The Oxford Bubble’, and I was kind of taking that to a literal level with the book, where you literally feel cut off from the world.”

Samantha’s experience of Oxford obviously comes hand-in-hand with her degree, and she emphasises the influence of what she has studied on her own writing, dedicating the book to metaphysical poet John Donne.“I mean I obviously didn’t have nearly as much of a knowledge of books before I got to Oxford, and, I think, you know, a lot of the Victorians made their way in, especially when I read Dickens. I threw in a character named Charles to give a little nod,” she laughs, “a very minor character but he is there. I love older literature, like Victorian literature, but also medieval dream visions are going to come in later as well.”

Despite this, Samantha is wary of equating The Bone Season with books that she has read either on or off her course, with one Oxford-set fantasy work in particular. “That would be a bit egotistical. I mean, I would like to be part of a literary tradition, I guess, but I certainly don’t compare myself to someone like Philip Pullman. But I guess it’s nice to be writing as part of, you know, lots of different books that have been written in Oxford.

“ I didn’t actually read Philip Pullman for ages,” she recalls, “because I wanted to make sure that my book was distinct from his.” This surprises me, but with more thought it makes sense; Samantha’s world is distinct from Pullman’s despite the similar setting so clearly the tactic was a shrewd move. “I’ve actually just bought Northern Lights now, so it’ll be interesting to read that!”

Beyond being distinct from Pullman’s vision, the Oxford that Samantha creates is one that any resident would be hard-pressed to recognise, with Port Meadow a mined training ground and Broad Street transformed into a kind of shantytown. Most of the colleges remain as ‘residences’ for the otherworldly Rephaim, but sadly there was no room for Samantha’s own alma meter. She sighs, “The only colleges I include in there are like 1859 and before, so obviously St Anne’s were kind of formally established in the 1900s. But to be honest, it just didn’t look like somewhere a Rephaite would live. It’s not an attractive-looking college, St Anne’s, for definite,” she says with a laugh.

Unfortunately, St Anne’s won’t have a chance to make a comeback in later books, as Samantha is determined to explore different locations. I suggest that this mirrors her own departure, and she agrees. “In a way yeah, I think I have definitely moved on, the same with the books I guess. We might go back briefly, but it won’t be on the same sort of level that it was in The Bone Season.”

So Samantha’s path is upwards and outwards, her undergraduate life consigned to a past chapter. And yet she’s certain that there was no other place where she could have created her fantasy adventure. “I think I might have passed living there, but I love Oxford. And I like to write about places I know.”

The Bone Season, £12.99, is published by Bloomsburyfrom Tuesday.