Go Ask Alice

When I first read Go Ask Alice, I was 13 years old. I thought it was a really fantastic book because the novel, although somewhat dated, seemed to portray a very realistic and haunting record of this girl, “Alice”, and ultimately of the horrors that can come from getting addicted to drugs, etc. When I decided to reread it two years later (and after some introduction to the realities of the drug life) I found it terribly shallow and mainstream- not at all the tale it had been for me previously. The main character is insubstantial and flighty. The introduction is slow and arduous back-and-forth with a stupid teenage girl and her failure to make any good friends. She ends up making poor decisions and then completely screws up her life until she dies. So yes, she makes poor decisions, and yes, she gets hooked on drugs because they’re awesome. However, I found it completely irrelevant to my life and still do. It’s another scare tactic for young preteens who are uneducated about drugs and personal choices. This girl screwed up her life. Did drugs screw it up? No- it is apparently that she’s weak and ignorant from the start. Unlikable. Boring. I gained no insight from this book and was honestly offended that it would be so popular.

The fact that this is someones diary, her real thoughts and experiences, makes this a bit of a tough read. Despite that it's a "must read".

Drug hazed statutory rape? Check. Vacillating between guilt riddled sobriety and emotional benders? Check. That incredulous feeling you get knowing this particular druggie had little reason to turn to drugs in the first place? Check.
Yeah. Tell your fourth and fifth graders to read it now.

omg amazing incredible and somewhat frightening... my best friend gave it to me to borrow and i picked it up and laid there and read it till i was finished...

One of the most real and fascinating books I have ever read. I really felt like I knew this girl after I finished it.

I read this book in the fifth grade. No lie (save the book itself). AHA!!
I'm doubting I'd have the patience/tolerance to read it now-a-days, due to the (now) tired concept. Assuming Alice was a mere figment of some closet-writers imagination (which seems to be the case), and given the era in which the piece was written, I liken the idea of telling such an intense story from a very intimate perspective with originality and creativity. It was not done many times before this book. Theres no proving it, but perhaps this is why the concept of drugs & journal entries is so worn out now...Go Ask Alice sold out & raked in that ca$h money. That's always a good enough excuse for unoriginality and virtual plajiarism in this country, right?

As far as the controversy over whether or not the book was a true story goes; I'm actually not sure and I don't quite care, but I find it pretty fucking awesome that it left poeple to guess and wonder. That's a statement in its own, wouldn't you say?

Read between the lines.
AlwaysAlwaysAlways.

rich, compelling book, even though it is annonymous you still feel you know "alice" like one of your good friends. amazing book, but horribly gruesome because of how true it is.

this book would have been a lot more touching had it been true.
yes she goes through a lot and yes ; this could possibly happen , but no one should purposely create this story in order to "open the eyes of the youth"

This book exists as no more than a scare tactic for young children.

It is not well written. The moral of the story often overrides any attempts to get prosaic.

It is not convincing. I wouldn't believe for a second that this was the diary of a young girl. There are none of the digressions into banal minutia of adolescence, and very little described outside of Alice's relationship with drugs.

It's just provocative, but ultimately you could get a lot more expository fiction and nonfiction relating to battles with drug use and the consequences thereof. However, that would defeat the point of this novel: a dumb little book for concerned parents to give their uneducated kids.

If I ever see my kid with a copy of this, I'm buying him Junky by Burroughs.

Unrealistic portrayal of a teenage girl's experimentation with drugs within a socially deviant crowd. Not only was this 'diary' a fabrication by a middle aged woman, but there is a whole series by the same author dedicated to scaring tweens (one of which introduces the theme of an occult lifestyle and consequently, a troubled teen's possession by a demon named Raul)