Go Ask Alice

Reason Book Chosen

This book has sold over five million copies, is one of the most banned books, and is very controversial.

Bibliographic Information

Author: Anonymous

Publisher: Simon Pulse

ISBN: 0133571114

Copyright Date: 1971

Genre

Fiction (now listed as such by publishers but once listed as nonfiction), Realistic

Reader’s Annotation

Alice is far far away from Wonderland.

Plot Summary

Fifteen year old Alice is isolated, depressed and has low self-esteem, especially when it comes to boys. She lives a fairly normal, boring life in the suburbs, the daughter of a college professor, and she doesn’t seem to have a lot of friends. She starts a diary, the format for the book. Soon Alice’s family has to move because of her father’s job. Alice is excited when she is sent to her grandmother’s house during summer vacation. There she runs into an old high school acquaintance, Jill, and a few others, and someone gets the idea to slip acid in Alice’s drink. This leads Alice to do drugs in a very quick decent. She soon loses her virginity and starts doing more and more drugs. Alice also runs into a boy, Roger, whom she once had a crush on, and worries what he thinks of her. At a certain point Alice thinks she might be pregnant, but is not. After returning from the summer, she meets a new friend, Chris, whom also likes to do drugs, and Alice dates a drug dealer and starts dealing a little bit herself. Eventually her and Chris runaway to San Francisco, where it is utopia at first, but then they have a few unfortunate situations happen. Alice goes through some really rough periods and slowly unravels, mentally, and eventually returns home after experiencing homelessness and despair. Even though Alice eventually comes back, gets help (is committed after trying to hurt herself), and things are looking up, especially with Roger, the book ends in tragedy.

Critical Analysis

Some people think this book is exaggerated, is propaganda, is even, perhaps, fiction disguised as preachy nonfiction in a diary format. The question-marked entries make it feel more substantial, but it is hard to know if the author was just not very clever. Reading it as an adult, it felt more like propaganda than it might have had I read it as a teen (I probably would have just been scared but not had the insight to think of it as propaganda).

Regardless of whether it is true or not, many teens can relate to the good-girl-gone-bad (or wanting to go bad), the desire to be popular, to have thrills and adventures, and to experiment. The actual portrayal of drug use and abuse seems somewhat realistic.

The diary entries work well as a format, the pacing is good, and the entries do seem to capture Alice’s state fairly well. Alice’s self-esteem issues - how she feels about her weight, boys, and sex - also seem to reflect what many teens experience.

Themes/Issues/Tags

Drug Addiction/Abuse, Coming of Age, High School, Pregnancy, Suicide, Banned, Mental Health, Runaway, LSD

Challenging Subject Matters

This is one of the most challenged books of all time. Some reasons include profanity, references to runaways, drugs, sex, and rape, and blasphemy.

Curriculum Ties

Health - Drugs - Addiction

1960s/70s

Propoganda?

Reading Level

11+

Interest level

12-18