Admission

March 23, 2020
Based on the 2019 college admissions scandal, Buxbaum’s ripped-from-the-headlines story gives readers a fictionalized peek into the families who saw no harm in helping their already advantaged children through bribery, cheating, and fraud. Daughter of a venture capitalist and a sitcom star, high school senior Chloe Berringer has enjoyed a relatively challenge-
free existence. Though Chloe is aware of her white privilege, she refuses to see others’ hardships, including those of her best friend, Shola, a Nigerian-American scholarship student at the girls’ private high school. Shola’s SAT scores are high enough for her to get into any U.S. college, but attending one depends entirely on scholarship funds, a concept that Chloe can’t wrap her head around. When her family is implicated at the center of an admissions scandal, Chloe finds her world tumbling down. Written in alternating chapters—“then” details the months leading up to the events, “now” portrays occurrences following her mother’s public arrest—the novel follows Chloe as she begins to understand her narrow worldview and possible complicity. Though Buxbaum (Hope and Other Punch Lines) is heavy-handed with the moral lessons, her assessment of the entitled 1% feels spot-on, making Shola’s earned success particularly satisfying. Ages 12–up. Agent: Jennifer Joel, ICM Partners.

April 1, 2020
Ripped from the headlines of the 2019 Varsity Blues admissions scandal. Seventeen-year-old Chloe Berringer is the wealthy, white daughter of Joy Fields, beloved TV sitcom star. An indifferent student, Chloe attends private school and is stunned by the revelation that her entire application was doctored. Chloe wrestles with guilt, shame, anger, brutal social media responses, and frayed family relationships following the revelation of her parents' cheating and bribery. The intersections of race, class, and privilege are explored primarily through Chloe's relationship with her best friend, Shola, a Nigerian American girl on scholarship at the school. The chapters alternate between the present day, beginning when her mother is arrested, and the point leading up to the arrest, starting three weeks into her senior year. Knowing that there were dozens of real-life students coping with similar crimes and the deep betrayal of their trust in their parents makes Chloe's tale both heartbreaking and thought-provoking. Believable subplots focus on her love interest (a biracial Asian Indian/white boy), undocumented immigrants (through Chloe's mentoring of a young El Salvadoran boy), and the pain of drug addiction (through her older half brother). While not entirely one-dimensional, supporting characters who do not share Chloe's racial and financial privilege sometimes seem to be present as devices to support her awakening. Deft, page-turning, and fresh as the latest college admissions gossip. (Fiction. 13-18)

COPYRIGHT(2020) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

May 1, 2020

Gr 9 Up-Chloe's world is turned upside down when the FBI shows up at her front door to arrest her mother, a beloved sitcom actress, who is believed to have taken part in a college admissions bribery scandal. Told in chapters that take place in the present and recent past of Chloe's senior year in high school, readers are given an exclusive look at the privileged life Chloe and her family lead, and how the fallout from the scandal changes everything. Buxbaum does a solid job of crafting realistic main and secondary characters, which gives this ripped-from-the-headlines story believable insight into the scandal that took the nation by storm. Although Chloe lives a fortunate life, she is not unaware of the struggles of others: Her best friend Shola, a Nigerian American student, studies very hard in hopes of securing a scholarship for college. Cesar, the elementary student she tutors, worries daily about whether his mother, an undocumented immigrant from El Salvador, will be deported. When Chloe gets in to her dream college and her best friend is wait-listed, she recognizes the unfairness of the situation, but it is not until she loses her friendship with Shola that she truly begins to grasp the consequences of her and her family's actions. VERDICT This timely character-centric novel, which is a gripping, thoughtful exploration of contemporary themes, deserves a place on both school and public library shelves.-Samantha Lumetta, Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County

Copyright 2020 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

December 15, 2020
Grades 10-12 Inspired by the college admissions bribery scandal that hit headlines early in 2019, Buxbaum (Hope and Other Punchlines, 2019) crafts the story of Chloe Berringer, eldest daughter of a beloved sitcom actress. A senior in high school, Chloe struggled through her college applications, never Harvard-bound like her best friend and boyfriend. Still, an acceptance letter to Southern California College, one of her reach schools, means that the only worry Chloe has now is what to wear to prom. But that's before the FBI knocks on her door with an arrest warrant for her mom and a scandal that will change Chloe's life forever. Buxbaum walks a fine line as she borrows details from true events in order to develop Chloe's fictional experiences. And while Chloe is not an unsympathetic figure, Buxbaum takes care to depict how, consciously or not, she was complicit in her parents' crimes, telling the story in alternating then-and-now chapters that show Chloe acknowledging the privileges she has in a rigged system. An absorbing and topical novel, tailor-made for discussion groups.

COPYRIGHT(2020) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

July 1, 2020
One Monday at 6:30 a.m., seventeen-year-old Chloe opens her front door to find a group of FBI agents, guns aimed and ready to arrest her famous actress mother for cheating to get Chloe admitted to Southern California College. Naturally, Chloe is stunned: sure, the college counselor her parents hired, Dr. Wilson, has a "sleazy-car-salesman vibe," and sure, it was weird that her most recent SAT score was 240 points higher than on her previous try, but she hadn't realized her parents were committing a federal crime. Lawyers fill their house; strangers hate-text her; her best friend and boyfriend desert her; and she feels like the world is laughing at her stupidity ("It's not like SCC is an Ivy," she hears a lawyer sniff). Chloe's feelings of humiliation, fear, shame, and anger are explored in chapters labeled "Now"; alternating "Then" chapters detail her growing suspicions about Dr. Wilson amid her excitement about her new romance. Throughout, Buxbaum is sensitive to Chloe's family's plight but doesn't excuse or defend it. In fact, it's Chloe's examination of her white, wealthy privilege and her own role within an unjust system that allows her to move forward. Whether or not readers are familiar with the real-life events that inspired the story, they're likely to find it captivating; the novel goes behind the headlines to add humanity and complexity to a juicy national scandal.

(Copyright 2020 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

November 1, 2020
One Monday at 6:30 a.m., seventeen-year-old Chloe opens her front door to find a group of FBI agents, guns aimed and ready to arrest her famous actress mother for cheating to get Chloe admitted to Southern California College. Naturally, Chloe is stunned: sure, the college counselor her parents hired, Dr. Wilson, has a "sleazy-car-salesman vibe," and sure, it was weird that her most recent SAT score was 240 points higher than on her previous try, but she hadn't realized her parents were committing a federal crime. Lawyers fill their house; strangers hate-text her; her best friend and boyfriend desert her; and she feels like the world is laughing at her stupidity ("It's not like SCC is an Ivy," she hears a lawyer sniff). Chloe's feelings of humiliation, fear, shame, and anger are explored in chapters labeled "Now"; alternating "Then" chapters detail her growing suspicions about Dr. Wilson amid her excitement about her new romance. Throughout, Buxbaum is sensitive to Chloe's family's plight but doesn't excuse or defend it. In fact, it's Chloe's examination of her white, wealthy privilege and her own role within an unjust system that allows her to move forward. Whether or not readers are familiar with the real-life events that inspired the story, they're likely to find it captivating; the novel goes behind the headlines to add humanity and complexity to a juicy national scandal. Rachel L. Smith

(Copyright 2020 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)