Best essay compilation book

Applying to College
1

<p>I was sifting through Barnes and Noble's college section and I noticed a few books about writing the college essay, almost all of them with real essays inside of them, and a few books with only real essays in them (most of them from Harvard Crimson).</p>

<p>I find it hard to evaluate them and decide which I should buy. I think that by reading these I can in some way internalize the style of writing about yourself, and understand the form itself. </p>

<p>Ofcourse, I am most interested in the ones published by Harvard, because I think that obviously, those essays written by successful Harvard applicants must be the best ones around. Then again, this may not be true, because most Harvard applicants may have other things in their applications going for them, in which maybe the quality of thier essay didn't matter?</p>

<p>Anyways, please let me know what essay collections you think are best and what you think of the following ones in particular:</p>

<p>50 Successful Harvard Application Essays
Essays that worked for College
100 Successful college app essays</p>

<p>I am seriously considering the Harvard one.</p>

2

<p>I got one book from the library that I thought was pretty helpful. It had a bunch (50?) of successful essays, plus commentary from adcoms about what was good and less good. It also had a few "essays that bombed", so you know what to avoid.</p>

<p>I would stay away from a book of only essays. Even the best-liked essays in the book I read had some things the adcoms didn't like. You don't want to internalize the flaws with the good points accidentally!</p>

3

<p>I found the book I was talking about. It's How to Write a Winning Scholarship Essay: 30 Essays That Won Over $3 Million in Scholarships by Gen and Kelly Tanabe. The advice is obviously geared more towards scholarships, but can be applied to admissions essays just as well.</p>

4

<p>Harvard has good essays + invaluable advice</p>

<p>= the best</p>