Book Notices | Early Decision by Lacy Crawford / The Clockwork Muse by Eviatar Zerubavel

Lacy Crawford, Early Decision

Amazon   I probably would not have picked up (or rather, downloaded) Early Decision if it were any other year. But since my daughter's a senior in high school and working on her common app right now, the subject was appealing. It's kind of an odd read, because for most of the book it feels more like a memoir than a novel. This changed at the end, however, when the book became less about the applications and more about one of the family dramas that was building throughout the book. It ended well, though I could have done without the epilogue. it's probably just me, but I find movies and books that give you an update on the characters' lives years hence unbearably sad: so much time lost in the interim. On a different note, throughout the book I found it annoying that the essays the students were writing were so long: the common app currently allows a 650-word essay. Before that it was 500 words. But I gather that before 2011 the word count was unlimited, so this must be the period of time the author was working with. Thing is, there's a big difference between a 1000-word essay and one that's 650 words long in terms of what can be accomplished. I also thought that in some cases the essays included in the book were unrealistically good, as though written by professional authors. On the other hand, a couple were described as awful, as giving the student no chance at getting in anywhere, and I hadn't thought them so bad. So.... I don't know.

Eviatar Zerubavel, The Clockwork Muse: A Practical Guide to Writing Theses, Dissertations, and Books

Amazon   Zerubavel here provides practical advice about making time for and scheduling large writing projects. I can't say that I learned anything from him that I'd want to implement myself: Much of the advice is self-evident, and I have no need or interest in making the sort of highly detailed working schedule or timeline that he advocates. But graduate students might find what he has to say useful for working on their dissertations. I do find impressive how very organized the author is about his work, and I like reading about how other people organize their work lives, so I did find the book interesting in that respect. It's also peppered with bits of wisdom here and there, for example--and I've said this on numerous occasions to my kids--that you are more likely to be content in life if you want less than if you have more.