Bottom of the List Steve Attridge (BeWrite Books, £7.99) This novel by the convener of a new foundation degree in writing for performance at Ruskin College, Oxford, tells the story of the fictitious Roebuck University, where The Government has opened the top-up fees floodgates and accountants are more important than professors. Roebuck is headed by paranoid recluse Adam Bittermouth, who spends his time wooing millionaire donors and raking in Goverment grants and student fees. He persuades old-fashioned academic Frank Finch to supervise the doctorate of a bloodstained South American dictator who has enrolled at a price, but who has a comic misunderstanding of classic literature. However, Frank has powerful friends, including Molly Bloom, Hamlet, and the rest of western culture.

Initiate: An Oxford Anthology of New Writing (Kellogg College, £9.99) This collection by graduates of Oxford University master's degree in creative writing contains some gems. It starts with a haunting short story by Sophy Roberts, set on an Icelandic fishing trawler, moves through poetry and drama. But it is the extracts from ‘novels in progress’ that are most tantalising. What will happen to breast-cancer sufferer Milena in The Essence of Sandalwood by Stephanie Chong, and Bermuda, heroine of Time in a Bottle by Tonnie Wells? We can only hope that both manage to find a publisher. They earn their place in the anthology alongside pieces by established writers, including Christina Koning and poet David Constantine, who recently won the BBC Short Story competition.

It Could Only Happen in Oxford (Turl Street Storytellers, £7.99) Another creative writing collection, this time by members of a group run by Oxford author Sara Banerji. Each story is linked to a specific place in or around Oxford, and is followed by a factual description of each place. So Sara Banerji's story about memory loss, Seventh Well, ends in Headington Hill Park, while Sabita Banerji’s Telecommunication Plan is a slice of Cowley Road life and M S Clary is haunted by the ghost of the late Oxford author Barbara Pym.

From Bright Sparks To Brilliant Businesses Douglas Hague & Anthea Milnes (A&C Black, £25) This is a collection of profiles of people who have led spin-out companies or commercialised ideas from Oxford University. The most interesting thing, barely touched on, is when the ethics of academia clash with the cut-throat of high finance. The authors suggest to Lord Drayson, founder of Powderject, that spin-outs only grow after being sold to US owners. He responds by calling for European technology companies to be quoted on a single market.