"Impossible to put down."
– People. Critic's Choice. Four out of four stars.

"I couldn't get enough of it. 'The Overachievers' is part soap opera, part social treatise... I was so hooked on their stories that I wanted to vote for my favorite contestant at the end of every chapter... It reads like very good ... fiction, thanks to its winning cast, its surprising plot twists and its pushy parents, including one truly disturbed mother...

Robbins is also a good writer, and she must be a good listener, because she more than delivers on the promise of 'secret lives' in the subtitle... At the end of the book, Robbins offers sensible suggestions for reform... Robbins gets the big picture right."
- The New York Times Book Review. Editors' Choice

"Quick and riveting."
– Entertainment Weekly

"Thrilling [...and...] heartbreaking."
- The Washington Post

"All the kids are likable and the reader comes to care about them and their futures... Compelling."
- Newsday

“In this engrossing anthropological study of the cult of overachieving that is prevalent in many middle- and upper-class schools, Robbins follows the lives of students from a Bethesda, Md., high school as they navigate the SAT and college application process…. The portraits of the teens are compelling and make for an easy read. Robbins provides a series of critiques of the system, including college rankings, parental pressure, the meaninglessness of standardized testing and the push for A.P. classes. She ends with a call to action, giving suggestions on how to alleviate teens’ stress and panic at how far behind they feel.”
– Publisher’s Weekly

“Interspersed with the compelling, novel-like narratives of each teen’s hectic life are revealing looks into the issues these students face….Highly recommended.”
– Library Journal Reviews

“Robbins’ compelling investigative journalism traces a year in the lives of several overachieving teens at Walt Whitman High School in Bethesda, Maryland, a public high school often touted as one of the best in the nation…. The author concludes this eye-opener with suggestions for high schools, colleges, counselors, parents and students alike on ways to break the addictive, abusive cycle of extreme perfectionism.”
– BookPage

“Hot Type: Alexandra Robbins grades the lives of the amped-up, perfection-obsessed kids known as The Overachievers”
– Vanity Fair

“In The Overachievers, journalist Alexandra Robbins delivers a poignant, funny, riveting narrative that explores how our high-stakes educational culture has spiraled out of control…Robbins tackles hard-hitting issues such as the student and teacher cheating epidemic, overtesting, sports rage, the black market for study drugs, and a college admissions process so cutthroat that some students are driven to depression and suicide because of a B. Even the earliest years of schooling have become insanely competitive, as Robbins learned when she gained unprecedented access into the inner workings of a prestigious Manhattan kindergarten admissions office. A compelling mix of fast-paced storytelling and engrossing investigative journalism, The Overachievers aims both to calm the admissions frenzy and to expose its escalating dangers.”
– Hyperion