Reviews for Marketing Higher Education: A Handbook for College Administrators

The average rating for Marketing Higher Education: A Handbook for College Administrators based on 2 reviews is 3 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2012-03-22 00:00:00 Dbs Cks EDIT: Methinks I was too hard on this book. It's flawed, yes, but it still pops into my head periodically even after 1+ years -- that must mean it worked its way under my skin, & that's almost always a good thing. Also, given the wildly variant quality of Historical Lit Fic, this was a very readable specimen that held my interest from start to finish. So I'm bumping my rating to 3.5 stars. :) I'll leave the original review intact, but take my grumps with a grain of salt. FIRST REVIEW: This book tries to be awesome, but ultimately collapses under its own weight. Clearly the author envisions a blend of multiple genres -- pastiche, magical realism, grotesque, revisionist Victoriana, & even a touch of steampunk -- but it just doesn't mesh. DiRollo does a decent job with the high-handed language of Victorian potboilers, & she pens some great descriptions to paint scenes in the reader's head, particularly the rambling mansion packed with artifacts & the oppressive beauty of 19th-c India. But the plot begins in the middle of everything & offers little explanation -- the rescue of Alice, yes, but WHY? The characters, too, are just plopped into the story, with prior relationships that aren't clearly defined yet obviously mean a great deal to what's happening right then. And while the aging aunts come vividly to life -- with an almost Wodehouse-like sense of absurdity -- Alice & Lilian themselves don't show much depth. We don't know the bones of their characters; their urgency must be told repeatedly & taken on faith because it doesn't come alive on its own. Likewise, the male characters are jerks -- they become stock examples of villains, users, abusers, & brow-beaten horndongs. Even one positive male character in a major role might have improved matters -- so why the bleakness? Such an imbalance makes the author's agenda screamingly obvious. Women have been grossly mistreated by patriarchal science, patriarchal society, patriarchal mindsets, etc etc. Okay. I get it. But repeatedly bludgeoning your reader doesn't win brownie points. It just morphs flat characters into revisionist mouthpieces. I did enjoy the juxtaposition of the sisters' stories -- Lilian's exposure to & identification with the "savages" of India compared with Alice's persecution by savage powers-that-be in the cultured safety of England. That alone would have made for a powerful statement in a relatively short book with such vivid imagery. But compared to similar -- and superior -- books like Bloodsmoor Romance or Sarah Waters' Victorian novels, where such a message comes across rather effortlessly, Proper Education doesn't succeed. It's too bad, really; the oddity of the mansion, the Greek chorus of tottering aunts, the wry humor, the romantic fails, & the flashes of gloomy magical realism were intriguing, if not precisely excecuted.

Review # 2 was written on 2012-11-22 00:00:00 Cassandra Brown I expected more on the Sepoy Mutiny of 1857 in India, but I was pleasantly surprised, in any case. This was a delightful comedy/farce/satire on women in the Victorian period. I found myself chuckling from time to time at the author's wit. The two Talbot sisters, Lilian and Alice, are two 'round pegs in square holes', not the stereotypes of Victorian womanhood at all--think Bronte sisters or any woman travellers of that period, say, Gertrude Bell. They live with their father, an eccentric and inveterate Collector [his collection will bring a smile to your face], several dear aunts, and odd gentlemen with bizarre interests, who live with the family, helping Mr. Talbot. After an 'indiscretion', Lilian is married off and packed off to India. The strong Alice remains as curator of her father's collection of curios and objets d'art from all over the world. She is also an amateur photographer and caretaker of the family hothouse, in which she wheels a peach tree from the hotter area to the cooler area and back again as needed. She receives a mysterious letter from her sister, ostensibly about tiger-skin cushions. A photographer, Mr. Blake, one of her father's guests, helps her decipher the letter. The evil [or is he just misguided in his pursuit of scientific knowledge?] Dr. Cattermole, a friend of her father's, has ideas about Alice's future and plans to act on them. In India, Lilian, married to a dour, humorless missionary, begins to assert herself. She disappears from time to time to paint Indian flora and makes some money at it. Her husband, the hypochrondriac Selwyn Fraser, is appalled at her behavior. The other English are types, but funny, all the same. Lilian's husband dies; as a widow, her forceful personality is revealed more and more. She dresses 'native', adopting native habits. The other English want her to remarry. Lilian notes in one place in the novel: as a girl or wife, a woman is under her father's or husband's thumb; as a widow, people respect her opinions. In trying to escape her oppressive life, she is embroiled in the Sepoy Mutiny. Mr. Blake [along with part of the Collection] helps Alice escape her planned fate. Do the two girls finally reunite? Witty writing and an unusual story were pleasurable. The descriptions of the Collection were very clever; the scene of the eruption of the artificial volcano made me smile. The novel reminded me in parts of the play and movie "You can't take it with you" by Moss Hart, although with different setting. Recommended.