I Went to Vassar for This?

by Naomi Neale

When a microwave malfunction transports her back in time to 1959, trendy Manhattanite Cathy Voorhees finds herself in a world devoid of PalmPilots, the Internet, and cell phones, where she, while trying to find a way back, vows to change history--with a little help from her handsome neighbor. Original.

Genres: Chick Lit, Time Travel, Romance, Fiction, Audiobook, Fantasy, Humor

342 pages, Paperback

First published December 26, 2006

About the author

Also published as Naomi Nash

Naomi Neale, a pseudonym for Vance Briceland, is one of the few men writing in the romance genre. He writes stories aimed at young women, in the subgenre sometimes called "chick lit," and novels for teenage girls as Naomi Nash. "Many people tend to be surprised that I don't mind writing for what's perceived as a female-oriented genre," Neale told Derrick Sobodash in an interview for the Royal Oak, Michigan, Oakland Press. Neale further explained to Sobodash: "I've always enjoyed stories with romantic components to them." His background figures into his writing to some extent. He is the son of two historians, whom he considers "storytellers," he told Sobodash. He also has a sympathy for outsiders and has done extensive volunteer work with youths, which has given him "insight into the mind of a teenage girl," noted Debra Pascoe in a profile of Neale for the online publication Life@Wayne at Wayne State University, where he works as an administrator.

Reviews

[Howard · Rating 4 out of 5]

4 Stars for I Went to Vassar… For This? (audiobook) by Naomi Neale read by Stephanie Brush.

It was fun going along on this journey back to 1959. Cathy Vorhees blows up her microwave and ends up taking the place of a woman back in the 50’s. She has an apartment with roommates and a job and the sensibilities of a modern woman. There’s a lot to correct in the workplace but she finds some time for romance too.

[Kathy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this book on a book swap shelf at the school where I teach. The title interested me and since it was free, I pick it up. I really enjoyed it and it definitely brought back memories of my early years as an entry-level business woman. The story starts in the year 2006 and is about a successful woman who is a marketing executive. After an accident, she ends up in the year 1959. The book then follows her as she comically tries to master the art of being an 'executive' before gender inequality in laws and culture were even discussed in hushed tones. Her funny need of the things she left behind and the advantages and disadvantages of both worlds made me smile. (As a side note, the main character is Cathy - my name - and her boss is Mr. Turnbull - my last name. Do you think it was Karma that had me reading this book?)

[Sara ♥ · Rating 4 out of 5]

July 4, 2008

I just finished reading this book, by Naomi Neale (who is also Naomi Nash, the YA author whose books I've been meaning to read for forever now)...

Oh my GOSH... completely hilarious and it ended SO SO SO SO WELL!!!! :) I've got tears in my eyes! *giggles* I'm in love with Hank!! YAY!!!! Okay, it's 2:35 AM, so I'm going to go to bed now... I seriously have ZERO self control when it comes to reading/putting a book down and sleeping.... ;)

Basic premise: Cathy gets hit in the head or some such (in 2006) and ends up back in time (Nov 1959)... which, to say the least, is a shocker. She falls in love with Hank.... because he's the hottie super-bomb... (to steal a phrase from High School Musical...) :) I love him, too!

[Robin-Ann · Rating 5 out of 5]

​This boo​k ​​is so much fun to read! I cannot recommend it enough. I laughed so much.

​If you can remember ​or relate ​to the laughable amazing cultural differences between the late fifties and today​, I believe you too will really enjoy this book. It gifted me with numerous moments of smiles from ear to ear.​

<3 to Cathy and to <3 and thank you to Naomi Neale.

[Baroness Ekat · Rating 1 out of 5]

I gave up. I got to page 70 (I think) and found that I just could not stand the main character. She went to Vassar? I don't believe it.

The amount of times I found myself putting the book down because I was just so annoyed by Cathy made re just give up on the book. Not worth it for me.

[Jessie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is a sassy, modern take on time travel. It all starts when Cathy Voorhees traveled 50 years back in time when her microwave explodes. She wakes as Catherine ----- when she wakes up in the 1950’s. It turns out that now she is living in the body of an wealthy, spoiled and corrupted woman who buys recipes and claims them as hers; in other words, this 50’s Cathy is a cook, a pioneer in the world of desserts. Cathy tries her hardest to adjust to her new lifestyle and personality, being careful not to reveal too much about the future. I had always been interested in time travel and what it would be like to travel back in time to a specific time period. Wow, imagine how cool it would be and I think that it would definitely give me confidence to have the knowledge of what is going to happen to the period I travel back to. Something mentioned in the book that shocked me was that Cathy was surprised to find that the 50’s were very much like the 21st century but without as much noise and pollution. I laughed when she mentioned how the 50’s weren’t in black and white; it was in color. It suddenly made me realize all the stereotypes I have of the 1950’s with all the war protest, beatniks, and black and white stuff; I thought it would be boring. However, I realized then that pictures without colors can really change a person’s perspective on certain things as compared to pictures with color.
One moral that was taught in this book was to be grateful of what you have and to always be true to yourself. I mean a person can only life one lifetime and as our surroundings evolve and as we grow older, we need to become more open-minded to the new ideas that are being introduced to us. Although our morals might not change, we have to keep in mind that time does change the things around us and we have to welcome new ideas and younger people to take a lead so we can retire.
But it never hurts to dream right?

[Tammy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really, really enjoyed this. Reviewing from an audio-book point of view.. I have to admit I wasn't sure I was going to be able to tolerate the character and/or her voice - but they grew on me very quickly. The characters were funny, the storyline enjoyable. I could be wrong, but I think hearing this book, instead of reading it, really added to it. I have a good enough imagination but it is different to hear the inflections of voice, and with accents (like a raw new-Yorker) it just makes the characters feel richer. I don't know - this isn't what I was expecting at all, but I am very, very glad I experienced this book.

[Anita · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved, loved, loved this book and didn't think of how it was going to end until it played out! I must admit I'm a time travel fantatic though and hope to do it someday before I leave this earth. Anyway, the book kept my interest all the way to the very end. There are enough characters but not so many you get overwhelmed trying to learn them all. You become very attached to them.

[Tiffany Morris · Rating 4 out of 5]

I pretty much never read the "chick lit" genre (and generally Have A Lot Of Opinions about that descriptor, but this book is pretty much a novel version of a "chick flick", so we'll let it go). I found this on sale and, as a lover of vintage/the '50s, thought the concept sounded fun. Then I lost my copy, found it the other day, and decided to finish it. A fun, light read.

[Amy · Rating 3 out of 5]

A modern (2000’s era) woman wakes up in a new life in 1959 after an accident. The story is about what I expected, and okay to read. The pop culture references and humor added enjoyment to it.
Good =3 stars

[Rachel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Chick-lit with a time travel twist. Very amusing it is too!

[kevin kvalvik · Rating 1 out of 5]

Painful, dumb and dated

[Lejna R · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very cute!

[Lori · Rating 3 out of 5]

This review requires disclaimers. Let's get them out of the way.

1. Today's title is chick lit. In my universe chick lit gets graded on a curve. I go easier on this genre because I want to read it once or, perhaps, twice a year when the right cover-hook-mood strikes. Generally I am going out of my mind in real life and need some brain mush. This is not to say that all Chick Lit is created equal (read: mediocre pablum); some of it is quite witty and entertaining -- almost therapeutic to read when you are running zero to crazy in 60 seconds.

2. Today's title deals with time travel. I am such a sucker for time travel that I will read almost anything that touches on it. Just being about time travel is generally enough to get a book 2 stars on my rating chart. As long as the story is comprehensible and written in English I am apt to give it at least one more.

3. I am a Crank who honestly believes that I was not only born in the wrong location...but, also the wrong time period. In the 21st century I am just another wage slave attempting to function in the ever-changing world of whatever. In the middle of the 20th century, I would have been considered 'brainy' just because I have a high school diploma (not to mention a college one...or two...), weak eyes and small bazooms. Yes, I dream of being Marilyn Monroe's 'brainy' room-mate...

I Went to Vassar for This? cannot be mistaken for a great work of fiction. It is the literary equivalent of a summer pop tune that isn't really that good...but it is fun and catchy and gets stuck in your head and it reminds you of some great parties or your last real vacation. You just have to admit you like it even though you know it is never going to be a critic's darling.

Our heroine, Cathy Voorhees, is a young Manhattanite on the make...clawing her way up in the advertising game and loving every minute of it. The first chapter makes it clear that she is a self confident careerist but slack in her personal life. (A slob who seems to have no life outside her job.) In the early portion of the book, set in contemporary New York, Cathy is taken down more than a few pegs by her aged boss, Mr. Richmond. Richmond is not a fan of Cathy's in-your-face post modern/sarcasm laden ad pitches. When Cathy's big presentation flops with the Big Kahuna Client, Cathy is unceremoniously fired.

Arriving back at her apartment in a rage of disbelief and already plotting her comeback, Cathy decides to nuke one of her single-gal frozen dinners. A mishap occurs with the microwave, disbelief is suspended on all sides, and Cathy 'comes to' later in ANOTHER Cathy's apartment: Cathy Voight, denizen of New York City. 1959.

From here Cathy V. gets on the usual carnival ride of anachronism -- a character misplaced in time attempting to fool those around her, to fit in just enough to avoid the mental institution, and to find her way back to her own time. Along the way she picks up some clues about the other Cathy, whose life she is now living. This other Cathy V. is also a shrewd business woman -- in this case, the author of cook books. Cathy Voight also has secrets and is revealed to be a not-so-very nice person.

Both Cathys are hard to like. The time travelling Cathy Voorhees is just plain silly at times. Her lack of knowledge about history is especially painful to read...although I realise that it is meant to be humorous. (Lance Armstrong as the first man to walk on the moon? Yes, this is the name she dredges up for her incredulous 1950s audience. By her own admission, the only classes Cathy ever stayed awake for were her business courses.)

Still, I enjoyed the conceit. I spend enough time toying around in my head with just these sorts of fantasies. What if I could travel back in time? What decade would I visit? Wouldn't it be fantastic to wear those stunning clothes? Wouldn't it almost bring me to tears to turn on the radio and hear Sarah Vaughan and Nat King Cole and early Sinatra...and not one damned autotune anywhere on the dial?

An effort is made to also deal with what sucked about life in the 1950s. In Your Face racism and anti-Semitism anyone? This book has that covered. It is the one area where silly Cathy redeems herself and acts like a grown up and together woman who can't believe the grab-assing, the snobbery, the exclusion and the deeply closeted gay-ness that went down in the decade of Winstons and Jello-With-Vegetables.

Of course there is romance. It is Chick Lit. Read this one in your most comfy pair of flannel pjs this winter while chowing on some good quality chocolate. If you are a woman in 21st century America and you actually find the time to read, you probably need that sort of break.

[Jade · Rating 2 out of 5]

I could only get through the first three chapters of this book before I threw it in the donate pile. (I don't know where I got it. If I bought it years ago, if like my money back.)

I actually quite like the premise. It's certainly interesting and had potential to be a truly charming story.

But it isn't. Okay, the heroine is a little self-centered and a little bit oblivious in an irritating way. (She puts on her very best dress to go to work in. I get 1959 style isn't her thing, but I would think in any time, you could pick out the "very best night on the town" dress from the more everyday dress so she's a bit of an idiot for essentially not realizing wearing that generation's version of a ball gown or club wear is probably not appropriate for work, even without knowing what work she's in.)

I was kinda plowing through all that, turning a blind eye, but I finally snapped and it was probably at a somewhat ridiculous - if recurring - thing: The Pro and Con lists. They generally start out okay but both of the ones I could even get through devolved into the most asinine and inane things. Clearly the author thinks it's cute, and if she were mumbling these things to herself, I'd give them a pass. But she's not. She's writing them down. She's taking the time to write out the most bubble-brained self-arguments ever.

"Who's President?"
"Truman. Or...no. He's later. Or earlier. Crap."
"Told you!"
"Shut up."
"YOU shut up."

She's writing that down. In columns. As pros and cons.

I just can't.

[Sarah · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was really looking forward to this book based on the title. Unfortunately it has one brief mention of Vassar and absolutely nothing else to do with it. The heroine is self-centered, obnoxious modern-day woman who cannot get through two sentences without spewing verbal diarrhea. She doesn't know simple history, misuses simple vocabulary, and attributes modern concepts to everyone's motives. I'm also annoyed at her dialogue, which makes use of heavy-handed pop culture references in a way that is entirely unrealistic. It is offensive to even imply that this character might have gotten in to Vassar, let alone graduated from there.

I didn't realize the book would contain time travel when I first picked it up. That aspect could have been more interesting if the author had juxtaposed the two time periods to a greater degree. As it is, the only enjoyable parts of the book were the few brief romantic interludes between the lead and the tenor. But as far as I'm concerned this one is going on the strip-list.

[Ilana Waters · Rating 5 out of 5]

Although the majority of my book diet doesn't include chick lit, I had to make an exception for "Vassar." It's hysterically funny--especially when you see Cathy trying to cope with some of the 1950's challenges we've forgotten about today. But there were also moments where she pined for the past. For instance, she enjoys the peaceful atmosphere before muzak was pumped into every public establishment, or the lower cost of living in Manhattan. And then there were the guys who actually APPRECIATED a woman with curves! LOL. But there were also religious and race relations brought up (Jewish people and African-Americans were not welcome everywhere). Fear not--it has a happy ending (natch), and I found getting there to be a wry, laugh-out loud adventure.

[Tracy · Rating 1 out of 5]

I read this book several years ago and enjoyed it. Then I forgot the name. Then I found it. Then I reread it. And I wish I hadn’t. The writing is too colloquial, which works for some authors but not this one. And the author has multiple references to the differences in decades, but they’re all superficial and forced - even the barely there subplots. As if she would throw one in every once in a while when the thought occurred to her that maybe she was glamorizing the good ol’ days a bit too much. But you know what really pissed me off enough to get me to write this dumb review?


THAT TERRIBLE ENDING. It’s so messed up and cruel to someone not involved in the story whatsoever, and...no. Just no. I’m gonna go ahead and forget the name of this book again.

[Betsy · Rating 5 out of 5]

The funniest reincarnation romance I ever read,and I have read an incredible number.Prehaps its' because the snotty main character is sent back to a time period I knew well -the late 1950's. Cathy is fired from her job as an ad executive for TV dinners,not understanding why the catch phraze, "Just like Your Mother used to fake" is insulting. On an imposed austerity measure she takes home several aluminuim wrapped trays to heat up for dinner. Once in the microwave her dinner, of course, explodes and sends her back in time where she can't remember who is president and girls "won't kiss lips that say the brown word"

[Dani · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is your average misplaced-in-time romance, a bit like the movie "Kate and Leopold" in reverse. The author throws in a little social commentary but it is nothing too deep. The reason why the character was thrown back in time and the lesson she was supposed to learn weren't exactly clear, but that didn't really take away from this light dessert of a book.

I would recommend reading it rather than listening to the audiobook. The story is told in the first person and the character's many inner thoughts were difficult to distinguish from her actual spoken dialogue; it would most likely be easier with the written version.

[Kate · Rating 3 out of 5]

Found this when I was looking for something to listen to on a long drive. I was surprised by how much I liked it. The main character is a self-centered, kind of clueless woman in advertizing in 2006 who is transported by an exploding microwave into 1959. I probably would have tossed it aside if I'd been reading it since the character was so frustrating but the actor/reader is superb. She kept me engaged and laughing. Time travel is always intriguing and the rest of the characters were great examples of '50s adults.

[Christy · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is cute, mildly entertaining, and mostly inoffensive. The ending is weak (rushed and relying far too heavily on the silly time travel conceit that propels so much of the narrative) and Cathy, the central character, is shockingly stupid at times, especially for an ambitious, successful, supposedly well-educated woman, but, as a piece of pseudo-feminist chick lit piece of fluff, it gets the job done.

[Rochelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

First of all, I think Naomi Neale has crappy-sounding titles. I avoided this book because it sounded dumb, where in reality, it was a great, funny, and cute book!
She totally won me over with her ending.
Listening to this via audiobook slowed things down when I wanted to get through faster, but maybe I got to savor this more. :)

[&#x1f4da;Linda Blake · Rating 3 out of 5]

I listened to this book and the reader was very adept at creating the various characters. The book is amusing, but I felt I should be laughing more. I like time travel so the contrast of 21st century popular culture to that of 1959 was interesting. This new genre of book in which the main character is extremely self-centered and work is undervalued is disturbing to me. Another example is Shopaholic. It's an entertaining book, so I gave it 3 stars.

[Donna]

This book is the literary equivalent of a marshmallow, fluffy and light but ultimately not satsfying. I didn't particularly care for the heroine of the story as she spoke too much and seemed both self-centered and clueless about anything beyond business. I liked Hank, and I liked the ending even if the time travel was tropey as hell. And for some reason, the main characters linger on in my mind. I didn't pick this book up expecting greatness, but it was a mostly enjoyable read.

[Stefanie Jones · Rating 5 out of 5]

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[Nicole · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked the premise of a modern woman getting sent back to a "Mad Men" time period and seeing how she deals with it. Because Vaser was in the title, I expected the main character to be a little more together and her endless bably resulted in taking a while to warm up to the character. However, the book picked up and had a satifing if predictable ending.

[Phyllis · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this book!!! This is actually my third go around and each time I enjoy it more. Although it may sound like a bit of fluff, its really a well-written book. The author has living and working in New York City in 1959 down perfectly. If you love the movie Peggy Sue Got Married, you will probably enjoy this time travel novel too.

[Kyra · Rating 2 out of 5]

Yes, time travel. I'm ok with that. But the characters were pretty superficial and the heroine was kind of annoying. In the present day, she didn't really have much time for dating. But when she wrnt back in time, she suddenly spent a lot of time wanting to find a husband. Not the best romance, not the worst.

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

When I started this book, I didn't think I would get through it, but once I got going, I really got into it. There were some funny laugh-out-loud moments, funny and charming. Probably because I was born in the 50's so I could relate. Thought the ending was predictable.