Fifteen years after the release of his much-lauded, baseball-centric debut novel, The Art of Fielding, Chad Harbach returns to fictional Westish College (and beyond) with The Brightness (Little, Brown, Oct. 27), in which characters both returning and new are rocked by a campus scandal and myriad personal dramas. A critic for Kirkus found it well worth the wait, calling the book “brilliant, poignant, and absorbing” in a starred review. Harbach answered our questions via email.

Tell readers, briefly, about your book.

The Brightness takes place in 2015 and ’16, on the cusp of the #MeToo movement and Trump’s first election. At its heart lies the friendship between Pella, a 27-year-old who’s recently graduated from Westish College and is trapped in myriad forms of uncertainty about her future, and her younger best friend, Irma, a brilliant, bookish undergrad who undertakes a politically charged prank, the fallout from which roils and rattles the school. The book begins at Westish, a half-dilapidated, sports-obsessed college in northeast Wisconsin, heads to a late-summer wedding on Block Island, and on to New York City, then circles back to Wisconsin. It’s a novel about—among other things—what it’s like to be in your 20s, when life feels gloriously flush with beauty and possibility, if only you could get out of your own way.

How long have you been working on this book?

I’ve been working on this book for—deep breath—13 years. When I sat down to begin a new novel, I was full of ideas, or at least half- or quarter-ideas, and the last thing I intended to do was revisit The Art of Fielding. But as I scribbled in my notebooks, the character of Pella Affenlight (now Affenlicht) kept asserting and reasserting herself, until finally I realized I was going to have to follow wherever she went.

What inspired you as you were writing?

In recent years my chief inspiration has been my son, Ansel. When you live with someone whose contact with the muse is that constant and profound, you just pray that a little rubs off on you.

I also drew inspiration from the novelists I love (Tolstoy, James, Austen, Wharton, the other usual suspects) and the 20th-century feminist thinkers, like Gerda Lerner and Kate Millett, who informed the worldview of the book.

And when all else failed, I drove to the nearest body of cold water and flung myself in.

Where and when did you write? Describe the scene, the time of day, the necessary accoutrements or talismans.

For many years I adamantly considered myself an early morning writer, and one who worked best in public places like coffee shops. When I became a parent, which coincided with several other forms of dramatic life-upheaval, I abandoned that belief pretty swiftly. Now I try to write anytime, anywhere, and embrace the chaos.

I draft everything longhand, and my tools are simple: unlined Moleskine notebooks and uniball Vision Rollerball pens. They’re not the fanciest, but they’re inexpensive and they work. I also don’t mind having a little caffeine in my system and my dog, Curtis, supervising from the couch. After dark I light a candle, which lends a little ceremony to the proceedings.

What fall release(s) are you most excited to get your hands on?

Cleo Birdwell is one of my all-time favorite writers, and I’m thrilled that her hilarious novel Amazons will finally be back in print. I’m also looking forward to new books by Rachel Cusk [Life of M] and Emma Cline [Switzy].

Nina Palattella is the senior editorial assistant.