<p>so far;</p>
<p>On Writing the College Application Essay- Bauld
Elements of Style- Strunk</p>
<p>what other good general writing books or college essay specific books do you recommend?</p>
<p>Essays That Worked</p>
<p>Not a how-to. This is a cross section of actual essays written by kids who got in to good schools, along with comments on why they are effective. Shows the variety of possible approaches & thus is very freeing...</p>
<p>I personally like College Essays for Dummies. (Horrible name though). It has some very helpful prompts at the end of the book and lots of useful ideas for how to make yourself shine through in the essay no matter which topic you use. Very readable and practical. Great for people having a hard time getting started.</p>
<p>My favorite guide for essays is "Essays that will get you in College" by Burnham, Kaufman, and Dowman. The ISBN is 0764106104 and it shoulod be widely available for very little money. </p>
<p>Harry Bauld gets the accolades, but I find the book I recommend to be at leats its equal. There is a fair amount of subjectivity when it comes to books on essay, abd you have to be careful to pick a book that helps your style match your targeted schools. A few schools have their own idea on what constitutes great essays. For instance, I'll never forget how "different" -I'm trying to be nice- Connecticut College was from commonly accepted views on essays. By posting the best essays of the past years, Conn College showed how much they love the vapid and florid style that most people hate. </p>
<p>Knowing your audience is very important. </p>
<p>PS I did not like the Harvard book on essays; the exact title escapes me.</p>
<p>xiggi, what didn't you like about the Harvard book on essays?</p>
<p>I must disagree with xiggi: I thought SBmom's comment applied to the collection of Harvard essays: "This is a cross section of actual essays ... along with comments on why they are effective. Shows the variety of possible approaches & thus is very freeing... " Freeing was the operative word for the Harvard book, IMO. I do agree that you have to know your audience, and many of the Harvard essays are pretty off-beat...may not be the right thing for every school. What made it useful for my s. is that it took him off the idea of writing about a strength or interest of his, but rather into the zone of just SHOWING something personal about himself through any topic at all...grabbing and holding the interest of the reader is vital. However, I do think this book should be read as an adjunct to a more generic one on how to write a college essay.</p>
<p>I haven't read the books in quite a while, but I am pretty certain that "Essays that worked" is NOT the Harvard essay book I remember not liking. </p>
<p>I'll look for the books later tonight. If I remember correctly the 'Essays that worked" was a compilation of about 50 essays that showed a variety of style and had been presented to a number of schools. On the the other hand, the Harvard book I recall were all essays sent to Harvard. I'll get into more details after I refresh my memory, but I believe that some essays sounded overdone and not too natural, others were a lot lengthier than acceptable. Again, I do not remember too many details, except that I found other books on the subject more helpful.</p>