Book excerpt: Few people have as much experience helping students cope with college life as Douglas Stone, a long-time Harvard residential adviser and coauthor of Difficult Conversations, and Elizabeth Tippett, recent Harvard graduate and founding director of the university's peer mediation program. In Real College, they join forces to help students deal with nightmare roommates, handle academic pressures, make smart choices about alcohol and sex, communicate with parents, and address all the other big issues that can make college as challenging as it is exciting. Stone and Tippett deliver insightful, pragmatic advice with humor and compassion, in a style that parents and students alike will appreciate. This is one book that no college student should be without.