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Rating: 
Summary: Remind me again
Review: how I'm supposed to find anything relevant to MY situation in the advice given to three students, all of whose parents can presumably afford the $29,500 fee the author apparently charges the rich and credulous.Breezy title, breezy advice -- alas, I can't afford to be so breezy about my college applications. I have too much riding on this year to trust the facile assurances contained in this guide. I wish I could say I was able to glean even one useful nugget of information I could use or pass on to a friend; lamentably not. Back to my applications and vocabulary building.
Rating: 
Summary: Outdated, but somewhat useful
Review: I am rising high school senior, and read this book (along with others) to help me prepare for the college application process.
The book has a tendency to the melodramatic, emphasizing the college process as the supreme effort and focus of life. I take personal issue with some of the statements in the book, such as, "the college application is the most important document of one's life up to that point." (Personally I consider birth certificates and social security cards much more important). However, other points such as the emphasis on considering college while choosing your freshman year courses demonstrate a focus that borders on the obsessive and unhealthy. She makes a point about David Horowitz obtaining a 4 on a chemistry AP, but she decided not to take points off for that. She calls a 4 (which is the equivalent of a B in a college-level seminar) ordinary, and a 5 (a college A), excellent. I find this extreme comparison somewhat difficult to justify.
However, there are some useful aspects to the book, which can basically be summed up as don't blow off your application, it's important too. The most helpful section of the book is on the brag sheet, a rarely correctly done section, but other than that the main advice the book gives is to focus on the applicatiions and that no one is guaranteed a slot.
It should also be pointed out that this book is somewhat outdated now. The recent Supreme Court decision regarding the University of Michigan's affirmative action policy outlaws the points system, which is the total basis for evaluation of this book. Since then, colleges have been required to switch from this system, so this is now outdated in terms of its specific usefulness.
However, it's core idea is good (to focus on your application), and it does have useful information about the brag sheet.
Rating:
Summary: more glitz than substance
Review: In a way, this book perfectly mirrors the author -- mostly flash with not that much substance. Although Cohen represents herself as "having worked in the admissions office," at Yale, she did so as a VOLUNTEER reader, not as an admissions officer. I wonder why the media have not picked up on her lack of experience compared to other authors. On that experience and her Madonna-esqe publicity sense, she has based a thriving business which by all accounts she runs well. However, that does not make her an experienced admissions officer and it shows in the text. This book will of course give students some case studies to base their own applications on, but ultimately, it won't help all that much besides the many well-published facts it regurgitates about admissions. The style is breezy and readable although the book feels like a plug for her business. The best part of the book is the title.
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