Admissions Officers have about 12 minutes to read a student’s application, which includes looking over their transcript, course rigor and grades, looking at their test scores, extracurricular activities, reading the Common Application Personal Statement, Yale’s required Supplemental Essay, reading the guidance counselor’s Secondary School Report, two teacher recommendations and interview report. And then they have to make notes – all within that 12 minutes.
The more stuff you send them, the greater chance that an Admissions Officer will have to skim everything – meaning an AO will read the first and last paragraph of your essays, do the same with each recommendation and everything you submit. So, in the end an Admissions Office will get a watered down view of who you are. Keep it simple; less is more.
Before presenting your application to an Admissions Committee, a regional Admissions Director will do their due diligence and google you. If you claim to have written a book, your name and the book should easily come up on Google or Amazon. If it doesn’t, my advice is to not even mention the book, as too many student’s (especially international students from India) are self-publishing their works. And Admissions knows what that is about.
FWIW: When she was 17, this recent Yale graduate had her play produced Off Broadway and received a glowing review from the NY Times. Here’s the review: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/11/theater/reviews/summer-shorts-5-with-ruby-rae-spiegel-review.html. That is the level of competition at schools like Yale. So, if your published work is not of the same caliber, you might want to reconsider submitting a sample, because as wonderful as your book may be, it just might not stand up to the competition.