My rating is neutral: I feel this is probably a good book if you know enough to get the jokes. I'm from UK so the nuances of USA college life and organisation passed me by.
It was another annoying pdf which makes me less inclined to make much effort in reading it, so I have skimmed through to get the gist. ( )

It's been a while since I read a book that full of wit and wisdom. A clever satire, LLGC paints college life vividly and hilariously. The main character, of Marcus Cleveland, is being presented as a car salesman, a very successful one, who hasn't told a joke in his life. That kind of statement is enough to make the reader like him automatically, and he doesn't disappoint later. Marcus needs to deal with the college's internal politics, with sophisticated multi-disciplinary educated fellows, and he does so using only his intuition and a college management book he reads. Against all odds, he succeeds. The other characters are also fun, even when they are not much more than caricatures. The reader comes across many random stupidities which are so daily-like, and the book manages to explain their inner logic. That on top of brilliant insights and a fascinatingly rich language, make a very worthwhile read. ( )

Although I am aware that this is a draft, it was therefore quite difficult to read because of the mistakes. Having said this, it was an intriguing and unusual book about a motley collection of strange people trying to run a college. I enjoyed it and have given it four stars. ( )

Long Live Grover Cleveland is a fairly gentle, but enjoyable, lampooning of small, liberal-arts colleges and those that inhabit them. The setting is an extreme case of such a college with an extreme set of inhabitants. The time frame of the setting seems indeterminate, given the background of the college and the level of technology in the story, but if anything it only adds to the charm. The plot is fairly straightforward, but moves along at a pleasant pace, and was enough to keep me wanting to turn the pages. The real draw here is the characters, which are drawn vividly almost to the point of caricature, and I have a suspicion some of them may be (names like Bella Proins and Brisco Quik send me looking for anagrams). The story did not proceed in the way I expected based on the dust jacket setup (“Used car salesman takes over small college.”), but that’s for the best. Overall, a light-hearted story carrying the misadventures of an enjoyable group of oddball characters with an ending that, though not terribly surprising, is nonetheless satisfying. ( )

Long Live Grover Cleveland caught my fancy because I am a sucker for the underdogs. I will always root for them, and I made no mistake rooting for Grover Cleveland. The book is a page turner; I think I read at a faster pace because I could not wait to see how the book ended. I liked that Grover had a way with people that he made them feel good about themselves. He was genuinely sincere and interested but I wished that things just didn't fall into place as much as that Grover had played a more active role in saving the college. I suppose I had higher expectations of the underdog and the things he'd do to turn the place around, one of my favorite books being To Sir with Love. Having said that, I would not change a thing about the book, Grover is as Grover does and the same goes for every thoughtful character in that book. In his naive and quiet way, he did get the college back on track and better. So Long Live Grover Cleveland! ( )