Admissions

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Summary: A comedic look at the private school admission process
Review: 2002's THE NANNY DIARIES cast a satirical eye on Manhattan parents and their cavalier attitudes toward their preschool children. Now, with her debut novel ADMISSIONS, Nancy Lieberman skewers the private school admissions process that is a rite of passage for a certain class of New Yorkers.

Helen Drager is the head of the Parents Committee at The School, an exclusive K-8 school where her daughter Zoe is an eighth grader. Helen's best friend, Sara, is The School's admissions director, and as such is a pro at weathering the annual deluge of phone calls and letters from anxious parents eager to make sure their four-year-old aces the KAT (Kindergarten Admissions Test) and nabs one of the few spots in next year's kindergarten class.

Helen is about to need all of Sara's advice --- and more --- as she and her husband Michael prepare to enter their own admissions battle: to snag Zoe a spot at one of Manhattan's top private high schools. Helen and Michael are sensible, down-to-earth people, and Zoe is a likeable kid, but the cutthroat world of private school admissions is enough to turn anyone a little crazy. Soon enough, Michael is promising the head of The Fancy Girls' School her own cooking show on the cable network where he works, and he's engaging in NBA trivia with the head of The Quasi Country Day School in the hopes that his knowledge of the Knicks will be enough to get Zoe in the door.

Helen's friend Sara has her own problems. Besides being inundated with calls and letters from stressed out parents, booking school tours for overscheduled preschoolers, and trying to have a semblance of a social life, she's being given the cold shoulder by her boss, Pamela. Ever since Sara hinted that she might like to be the head of the school someday, Pamela has refused to speak to her. Sara soon discovers that Pamela might be hiding more than just where she spends her afternoons, though...

Although ADMISSIONS is a comedic novel, it does have a serious point. The Dragers are a fairly normal family (at least as normal as people can be when they have that much money to spend on schooling), and it's easy to sympathize with their desire to have the best for their daughter. The countless other families who are used merely as the fodder for satire, though, sometimes go to extremes: "the LD, ADHD, HIV-positive son of the type A, hepatitis B, Vitamin D-deficient trustee married to the CPA with TMJ and chronic PMS." After 300+ pages of examples like this, the parents' endless neuroses and the children's myriad insecurities start to wear a little thin; some judicious editing could have cut out some extraneous material and kept the book more closely focused.

The primary audience of ADMISSIONS is a little hard to figure out. If Lieberman is targeting New York parents, her sharp observations might cut a little too close to the bone. Maybe she's aiming at those of us far from the Big Apple, who can rejoice in our own good public schools and laugh freely at the foibles of those privileged but pressured Manhattanites.

--- Reviewed by Norah Piehl

Rating:
Summary: The good, the bad, and the ugly side of School Admissions
Review: Admissions is an inside look at the Admissions process for the elite private schools in Manhattan. The process is mind-boggling, the paperwork, the details, the tests, and the interviews for kindergarteners yet alone for the eighth graders. Wealthy parents who want nothing but the best for their children will do anything to get their precious offspring into The School. Fame, money, and excellent test scores can be key to getting in the right school but not always. Parents network, and trade promises hoping to give their kids the extra nudge toward acceptance into their choice school. Pamela Rothschild as Head of The School, holds herself in high regard as to what she can and cannot do for your child. Sara Nash, Director of Admissions works hard to keep the process fair no matter how much parents call, send gifts, and letters reminding her of their little darling. Helen Drager is Head of the School's Parent Association. She and her husband Michael want to get their daughter Zoe into the right high school. You get taken along on the ride as the Dragers tour the different high schools. I felt the story runs out of steam just a bit by the end of the Admissions process. However, along the way, you will thoroughly enjoy the descriptions, the elation and the panic, the love triangle, the envy, the budding romance, and the day-to-day hustle of New York.

Rating:
Summary: A satiric view of private schools...fun and over the top...
Review: As someone who has spent his life in private schools, both as student and teacher/administrator, there is a lot of truth in this book. I have many friends from the NY private schools and this indeed rings true. Fortunately for me, the people I know at private schools aren't this bad. However, the character types are out there. I found Helen a bit hard to love, but perhaps that is me. The kids in the book are terrific, particularly Julian and Zoe. Michael and Sara have true hearts. Pamela is way over the top, but her scandals aren't. A good book, that at times is clearly a first novel. However, like the Nanny Diaries, you will laugh a lot and recognize people you know (if you know this world). Since I'm not a mother, perhaps I didn't relate to it all, but still a rare and fun read.

Rating:
Summary: A great read!
Review: Great book. Couldn't wait to find out where Zoe got in. Every scene was a "money shot" when it comes to real world admissions. Take it from one who knows. What a terrific writer!

Amanda Uhry
Manhattan Private School Admissions

Rating:
Summary: Comic Look at Private School Admissions
Review: Having gone through the private admissions process twice (1st grade and 7th grade), I highly recommend the book. (My child is now attending one of the models for the "Bucolic Country School" that Zoe applies to.) When we were applying, the elementary school principal told me that there is a college for everyone, but not a private high school, which perfectly describes why the parents in the book are so panicked. The book captures affluent parents that want their child to have an excellent education, as well as very wealthy parents who seem to want their child to attend a school based solely on prestige or to help their children overcome psychological problems. It also portrays the perspective of an admissions officer. The book is easy reading with a lot of witty comments. Although similar to The Nanny Diaries or The Devil Wears Prada in its portrayal of the NYC upper class, it's not mean-spirited. I finished the book feeling lighthearted, while The Nanny Diaries left me feeling very sad. If you're looking for "escape" literature and have gone through the admissions process or will be going through it, read this book.

Rating:
Summary: SORRY, TWO THUMBS DOWN FOR ME....
Review: I stumbled across this book on Amazon, and it sounded like a lot of fun. The concept was great....though in my opinion the novel never developed to its full potential.

The story centers mainly on Helen and Michael Drager, Manhattanites with one daughter, Zoe. Zoe is a student in one of the elite private Manhattan schools; however, she's about to enter the 8th grade and so the chase begins to get her into yet another elite, private, high school. The School (as it's called where Zoe is currently enrolled) is run by Pamela Rothschild, a woman who is both hated and feared, with a questionable history/background. Helen is President of the Parent's Association, and it also best friends with Sarah Nash, The School's admissions director. What follows is a story about the ridiculous lengths to which parents will go to ensure that their little tykes receive a "quality" education--that of course can only be had in private schools to the tune of 20K annually.

The Pamela Rothschild character, witch that she was, could have made this novel a lot more fun if we'd seen more of her. Helen Drager could have actually had an affair with the sexy Phillip Cashin--leading to even more drama. And I probably would have liked the Sarah Nash character if she had been developed a bit more. All in all, a lot of smoke but not enough fire. Disappointing.


DYB

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Summary: The Wall Street Journal Gushes
Review: I tend never to read reviews until after I've read a given book. I don't wish to be swayed by a reviewer, or had a plot line spoonfed. It is not until I have made my own decision that I seek that of the pundits. Nancy Lieberman's Admissions has slowly made its way up the pile of books by my nightable, until last week, it reached the top. Oh, how I wish I hadn't had waited. What a fantastic joy ride it was. Afterwards, I did a Google search to read what others had thought about this magnificent book, and came across this sensational review from the WSJ. SInce it was not listed in Amazon's editorial comments, I thought I'd share it here. It says it all!!!!! Enjoy!!!!!!!!

The Long and Bumpy Road
To the Perfect Resume

By NED CRABB


Helen Drager's daughter, Zoe, is about to graduate from The School, an elite institution that has done all it can to teach Zoe what it knows and prepare her for life in a rising meritocracy. Unfortunately, The School has classes only through the eighth grade.

Thus Helen must now fight like a tigress to get her cub into The Fancy Girls' School, The Very Brainy Girls' School, The Quasi Country Day School or maybe even The Progressive School -- or else ruin her daughter's chances to go to HarvardYalePrinceton, thereby dooming her to a life of low financial prospects, drudgery and unhappiness.

Such is the entertaining ordeal of "Admissions" (Warner Books, 355 pages, $23.95), Nancy Lieberman's first novel (and let us hope not her last). It depicts, as she puts it, "the Manhattan parents' version of a blood sport" as well as the day-to-day world of the privileged private school in all its eccentricity. Thus "Admissions" is populated by ruthless, insecure, ambitious characters, and some of them aren't even parents.

Success in life depends on getting into the right private school. Or does it?

Ms. Lieberman's cast will be recognizable to anyone who has had experience of private schools and thus run the admissions gantlet for himself or for his children. (And of course, you don't have to live in New York to know about school-credentializing pressure.) Real-life parents, though, may never have the privilege of Helen's insider view. Her best friend, as it turns out, is Sara Nash, the admissions director of The School. Like other admissions directors all over the city, she is the target of hundreds of anxious parents who must get their kindergartners into "the right school" or else ruin their son's or daughter's chances to get into HarvardYalePrinceton, thereby dooming them to a life of drudgery, etc.

In "Admissions," there is a wild card or two in the corridors, most notably The School's imperious headmistress, Pamela Rothschild, who is seemingly (accent, clothes, mannerisms) as upper-class British as a Barbour's fall catalog. But her seedy past is about to catch up and grab her by her Chanel suit. Pamela is power-mad, which is obvious to all, but no one cares because her recommendation can open school doors for their darlings. What is not yet obvious is that Pamela has also gone truly mad and is about to cause a scandal of nuclear proportions.

Ms. Lieberman's novel brings to mind the work of the great comic novelist of the 1940s and 1950s, Max Shulman ("Barefoot Boy With Cheek," "The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis"), who similarly used exaggeration to portray the essence of types, sometimes in a school setting. In "Admissions," Ms. Lieberman's seemingly absurd names for the schools of choice are actually dead-on labels for several very real places in Manhattan -- the equivalent of a secret shorthand that all parents, in their minds, attach to their child's potential résumé. (Whose child is not worthy of The Very Brainy Girls' School?)

As Helen and her husband, Michael, submit applications and go for interviews and tours, Helen's anxiety rises like a Kaplan-coached SAT score. She knows there are more students than there are places: "With a slew of children born to ambitious baby-boomers with six-figure incomes, gaining entree into one of the top private schools had become not only an enormous financial challenge but a tortuously uncertain odds-against-you gamble as well."


Battling forward for the sake of their only child, Helen and Michael interact with such characters as John Toppler, the lawyer who brays into his cellphone at cocktail parties and, for The School's fund-raising auction, offers up a free divorce or a class-action suit. There is the student tour guide Morgan Striker, of the Fancy Girls' School, where most students' first names are surnames. "By some fluke of nature, they all had the same, long, straight, shiny blonde hair, light eyes and full lips suggesting either that homogeneity reigned supreme at The Fancy Girls' School or that they were all related." Meanwhile, at the Progressive School, students spend their first year entirely in "the studio" throwing clay pots and their second year at "the learning center," where they lounge about at small tables and tell the teachers what the subject of their "seminars" will be from week to week.

"Admissions," it should be said, is not all comedy. Amid the farce and blood sport, Ms. Lieberman captures the shifting relations between over-concerned parents and their growing children. Zoe in particular seeks to make her increasingly hysterical mother listen to her own needs and desires concerning the school of "her choice."

When the Pamela Rothschild A-bomb ignites, stunned parents head for shelter: any school -- quick, call for applications! Schedule tours and interviews! Hell, contact the public schools! Only those for gifted children, of course.


Mr. Crabb is the Journal's letters editor.

Rating:
Summary: Thumbs Up in Fla
Review: My granddaughter has three kids in private school in Brooklyn. What can I do to help her is all I ever hear. I don't get it. In her day we told her to the local public school and boom, you're in kinderkarten. I talk to my neighbors in Boca, everybody kids' down here is goin thru the same thing. Like I said, waht's wrong with public school. My daughter gave me this book for Crhistmas. Now I get it. This is a very good piece of a book. It opened my eyes in a most enjoably way. Only one thing: why didn't the Drager's consider a good Catholic school?

Rating:
Summary: Very Brainy Satire
Review: This book, while being light, easy reading sure had a lot going on! There was family drama, eating disorders, embezzzlement,and adultery all mixed with plenty of teenage angst amidst a hilarious lampoon of the cutthroat world of upper class urban schooling. Especially if you know anyone who works in the world of private education you will find this over-the-top book to ring just a bit too true.

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Summary: Thank God for Catholic School
Review: We applied to several of the toney private school in our area. Talk about obnoxious yuppy parents. Talk about 14 year old girls dressing and actting like 21 year old hookers. Talk about sticker shock. This hystercal novel nails this sickness to keep up with the Jones' in an satircal, enjoyable way. The author puts down everybody. Including her own heroine. But in this sick blood sport, there are no winners. Only Ms. Liberman and her wonderful book.