The runners

in august, 2002, a survey by the {\it princeton review} found that indiana university, bloomington, was the number one partying school in the united states. in his novel, the runners, don light has imagined a small part of the student scene at indiana university. but there is more to the university and to the novel than partying, drinking, drugs, and sex. the novel does not neglect those themes but also focuses on running, music, science, love...and murder. dave pace, a graduate student in physics at indiana university, meets sarah golden, an undergraduate majoring in biology and music. they go running together, go to bed together, and, after several weeks, start living together. sarah meets a math professor and carries on an affair with him while still living with dave. dave starts running with another student, who is murdered in the woods. dave tries to help the police solve the crime, and he enlists sarah's help. the tangles and puzzles are eventually sorted out, some of them in surprising ways. the author, a retired professor, has lived most of his adult life in bloomington. when asked what made him retire, he said, ''for many years i taught a first-year physics survey course at indiana university. whenever i taught the course, at least one of my female students would come to my office near the end of the term, cry, and say, 'i will do anything [anything in italics] for a good grade.' when they stopped saying that, i knew it was time to retire.''