<p>The best book I’ve come across–better and more thorough, I think, than “Admissions Matters”–is “College Admission: From Application to Acceptance, Step By Step”, by Robin Mamlet and Christine Vandevelde. Great nuts-and-bolts advice, down-to-earth, realistic, not so anxiety-inducing like the “guides” pushed by the likes of Michelle Hernandez and Katherine Cohen. And the only book I know of that helps you (as it says) step-by-step with the Common App sections. Very up-to-date, too. Published 2011.</p>