The Admissions

My two oldest children are only a year apart in school. If I thought it was hard having them close in age as babies, I never even thought about the potential difficulties once they were high schoolers. And yet because doing the college application thing was so much fun last year, we're thrilled to get to do it all over again this year. (Terrible how sarcasm doesn't register very well in writing.) As you might suspect, the college search and application process is not fun in any way, shape, or form. So you could be forgiven for wondering why I'd choose to read a book about a family going through that very same thing. Meg Mitchell Moore's novel, The Admissions, won't help calm any fears you have about the process; in fact, it might amp show more them up a bit, but it's a fantastic and terrifying representation of a high achieving high school senior, her driven parents, and the younger siblings whose issues are overlooked as they take a backseat to the all important application.

The Hawthorne family looks like they have everything they could ever want. Father Gabe is a partner in a management consulting firm. Mother Nora is a very successful real estate agent in pricey Marin County. Oldest daughter Angela is her class' valedictorian and a phenomenal cross country runner. Middle child Cecily is passionate about Irish dancing. And baby of the family Maya is a pretty happy go lucky second grader. But life isn't everything it seems on the surface and as Angela applies to Harvard, the dream school she's been groomed for since toddlerhood, the cracks in the picture of perfection start to widen. Gabe has a secret at work that the company's newest intern, a predatory piece of work, threatens to expose. Worse, it's a secret he's kept even from Nora. Nora is completely overwhelmed with her job and the girls. A very important listing is about to expire and be pulled from her, she could be held accountable for something that was never disclosed on a multi-million dollar home she sold several years ago, and she's convinced that an accident that happened on her watch, an accident she never told Gabe about, could be the reason that Maya can't read yet. Angela is desperate to hold onto her number one class ranking, stooping to means she'd once never have considered and she can't even begin to imagine what will happen if she doesn't get into Harvard early admission. Cecily's dancing is suddenly slightly off and she's dwelling on some pretty morbid stuff for an elementary school kid. And of course, Maya can't read.

None of the characters have shared their burdens with the others, giving the novel an ever increasing sense of secrets kept, intentional omissions, and little white lies all of which threaten to destroy the characters and this life they've built. Despite the reader knowing or guessing all of the secrets, still the rising tide of guilt and poor decisions slowly and inexorably strangles the reader as the pages turn. Moore has really captured the panic and nausea, the stress and pressure of applying to college. Your heart can't help but go out to the over-achieving Angela who is so focused on the things that she thinks will make her application stand out that she has no time to enjoy herself or be a kid. Everything in her life has to be a means to an end and she can't afford to slip, ever. Every member of this family can feel the tension and stress filling their home with increasing desperation. And that's no way to live. Too wrapped up in their own personal dramas to admit to each other the difficulties they are facing, the terrible choices they've made, or the real future they want, it is still clear that these characters do care for each other and care deeply. Moore's creative use of SAT words throughout Angela's narrative sections helps highlight the way that everything about the college application process and the pressure to perform and know everything pervades the high school senior's entire life. Gabe's fears at work and Nora's out of kilter work home life balance serve to make them incredibly sympathetic and realistic. The story alternates perspectives between all of the Hawthornes except Maya, giving the reader a complete picture of the family that the characters themselves don't have. This makes the difficulties each character faces that much more poignant to a reader who can possibly relate to the underlying motivations of each. The narrative pacing is taut and increases consistently until the end when everything unravels, as it must. After the tension of the bulk of the book, the ending is a bit easy but it is a hopeful antidote to the stress that precedes it. A thoroughly enjoyable cautionary tale about self-imposed pressures consuming us, stealing our joy in life, and making us willing to deviate from who we know ourselves to be (or to not even have the chance to find out who we are), this will make you re-evaluate your life, your goals, and the expectations you place not only on yourself but on those you love. show less

Gosh.

Well, I really liked the beginning of this book. I was really relating to the characters, it felt like it was a slow examination of a family under what has become the typical pressures of a certain kind of family when it felt like it went careening off the tracks.


All of a sudden every darn member of this family has an insane secret or lie (or two) Except Maya, thank you Maya.

These are some awfully bombastic crazy things going on in their lives. And a mountain lion attack! And no one likes to tell anyone anything ever. Even though these are all insane things. I just don't know how this family functioned in any capacity with the amount of secrecy that went on.

One of my pet peeves in books is when we are just waiting and waiting for show more something to inevitably happen. This book had this going on in like twelve different directions. The author tried valiantly to tie up all the loose ends. Some were dealt with more satisfactorily than others - the plagiarism detour was so abrupt I feel like I am not sure why we went through that at all.

I did really enjoy the first half though. I'd love to read something by this author that sticks to more plausible storylines (or at least tamps down the amount of enormous problems/reveals).
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Meg Mitchell Moore perfectly skewers the culture of busyness and overachievement that is so prevalent today. Readers who are parents of school-aged children will find themselves equally amused and horrified by the pressures students face. At the same time, the discomfort they feel at recognizing themselves in Nora and Gabe drives home Ms. Moore’s point. The sardonic humor is biting, but it is the despair under which each member of the family soon strains which strikes the strongest chord within readers. The story is humorously bittersweet while striking a bit too close to home for comfort. More importantly, the message is not only timely but very important and well worth the read.

“It’s hard for everybody in some way, right?” Meg Mitchell Moore, The Admissions

Seemingly perfect at a passing glance, the Hawthorne family in Moore’s newest novel, “The Admissions” is actually desperately trying to hold on and keep everything together in their upscale, uber-competitive Bay Area community. Nearly every member of the family is hiding something – a secret, a mistake, a joke gone too far, their true feelings – but none can voice it, lest the whole house of cards come tumbling down.

Far from being another “life in the suburbs isn’t so grand” sort of book, I think Moore has really honed in on a new angle with this story. She accurately captures the extreme pressure high school students face with show more enormous amounts of homework, extra-curricular activities, and cut-throat college admissions mania. She also shines an unflinching light on competitive workplace practices, where one mistake can cost a person his or her job. She covers these realistically, and they are the reality for many people today.

The Admissions is simultaneously compelling, funny, uncomfortable, honest, and timely. 4.5 stars

Thank you to NetGalley and Doubleday for a galley of this book in exchange for an honest review show less

The Hawthorne family is ready to implode due to all the pressures of college admissions, and maintaining an upper middle class lifestyle. I know, I know....who wants to read a book about how tough it is for the fortunate among us? And it's a subject that has been done before. What makes this one shine above the rest is the author made every character sympathetic and relatable. That's not always an easy feat for an author but Ms. Moore pulls it off.

High-pressure jobs for both parents, balancing work and home, the stress and strain of juggling all the balls that keep a busy, high-achieving family afloat...how does it all get done? And what happens when a ball is dropped? Or expectations aren't met? But the book isn't all stress and show more strain, there's also a large dose of warmth and humor.

The title is a play on words. The eldest daughter is trying to get into Harvard, but every character has a secret they need to admit. Each chapter is told from a different characters POV. I loved the voices of the characters and the thoughts running through their heads. The SAT words were a very clever device, as was mom Nora's e-mails to her sister. The wife's boss and his wife have a heartbreaking secret, with a sub-plot that we don't always know what goes on in someone's life and we shouldn't make assumptions. What we think we know can turn out to be so wrong.

The author made the characters come to life on the page and I was invested in the outcome. This is a fresh take on modern family life that I found easy to read and thoroughly engrossing. There were a few instances that maybe didn't quite ring true (only one college application?) but it didn't stop me from thoroughly enjoying the read. show less

This book grabbed me and never let go. It is not that my life is like the Hawthornes, a high-flying couple with money who have given their three daughters every advantage in life. It is not that I have a child who is in the process of applying for college with the expectation that she get into Harvard. Not even close. But I do know what it is like to feel anxious and frightened about what the future will hold for her in this time of uber competition, fragmented work and instability. There are decisions that I have probably made based on these fears that have been misguided. And that is the power of the book. This family is so human, so flawed, so full of fear and love that I was immediately drawn into to their story. Each character was show more complex and it was easy to feel empathy for them as they slowly, but surely, began to fall apart from the demands that they thought they must meet and the secrets that they kept from each other, The daughter, Angela was especially well-drawn as she struggles to meet expectations yet retain some sense of self and her mother, a real estate agent, who is able to see how these expectations hurt her daughter but unable to see how having to be the top dog real estate agent is just as destructive is likable, funny and at times maddening. I cannot recommend highly enough this fast paced, sometimes funny, sometimes wrenching and thrilling ("what will happen next!?") book.

Thank you to Edelweiss for allowing me to review this book for an honest opinion. show less

This reminded me so much of Gabrielle Zevin's The Hole We're In and I loved it. Moore did an excellent job of hammering home the settings and with giving each of the characters, even ten-year-old Cecily, a really authentic feel. I was legitimately stressed out over several of the problems the characters faced as I'd become so invested, but none of the decisions they had to make were easy or trivial. Super impressed with this one.