The setting in A Separate Peace by John Knowles is in rural New Hampshire at a military school along the Devon and Naguamsett rivers. The school is called Devon because nobody would want to go to a school called Naguamsett. The time period of the novel is in 1942, during World War 2. One of the key settings in the novel is a tree of medium height right beside the Devon river. This is where Gene jounces the limb to make Finny fall . Another setting is the Butt Room, a nasty dungeon-like room in the basement of the school where students can smoke cigarettes. This is where Gene lies about how he supposedly killed Finny. Obviously Gene didn’t kill Finny, but the students in the Butt Room needed an answer. One of the most intriguing settings in the novel is inside Finny’s house, the place where Gene admitted to Finny that he intentionally jounced the limb and allowed him to fall and shatter his leg.   The Genre of A Separate Peace is coming-of-age fiction. It could also be described as a tragedy. This novel could be realistic considering that the events in the story happen in real life, but the fact that there is no Devon school and no Gene and Finny derails any thought of this novel being real.