"Go Ask Alice" is a novel that is market as a diary made into a novel for everybody to enjoy! Ya, I don't think this book is an actual diary written by a fifteeen year old girl throughout her struggle with drugs, and I looked it up on Snopes.com and they agree with me too! A diary is written only for the writers sake. When one writes a diary he or she does not expect anyone else to be reading it because it's supposed to be an account of one's most personal and deep feeling, but this book has great linear progression, a wonderful use of diction, and her style of writing never evolves over the two year period that the narrator supposedly wrote it over. While reading one can see the growth and expansion of her charater as she goes through of all of her experiences, but it doesn't seem that her writing style matures or changes. I know that if I read something that I wrote my freshman year of high school now, it would be much different than my current blog entries (actually just read a blog I made for my algebra II class freshman year, it was pretty hilarious). Then throughout the novel she barely mentions her relationships (both romantic and platonic) other than the fact she has them, but then she goes into heavy detail about her drug trips and apparent need for drugs. It is also never explained how this chick is going from San Francisco to Boston to Oregon and so on, without a drivers lisence or any real means of transportation. Even one night she literally just got high and found hereself in Boston with no explanation. I'm not sure if I buy that. This has many "teachable moments" too. For example the narrator tells a 4 page long story about some girl named Babbie, that just conviently had the moral of how things aren't as bad as they seem. Why would someone put such a long story about somebody else in there own diary though, especially since she never even mentions her again? My favorite mistake in the book is when the narrator says "After all I've just turned 15 and I can't stop life and get off" but she turned 15 eleven months ago according to the date of the diary entry, I don't think any teenager would forget his or her own birthday or age. The one thing that the author did get right was the great insight into the feelings and thoughts of the narrator, but that still doesn't make it a believable diary.
This novel was obviously either heavily edited or frabricated out of the imagination of the "editor" Beatrice Sparks who has written multiple other stories of teen drug abuse simular to this one. The book was  created to teach kids to just say no to drugs and tell the incredably tragic story of an unsespecting teenage girl, and of course to earn the author a good about of money based on its popularity. The whole anonymous authorship seems to just be a kind of gimmick used to help get the story across, add a feeling of realism to the story, and get people interested in the "true" story of an unfortuate girl. However, I don't think this is a truthful story, I do think it is a good one that deffinating holds a reader's interest and I would reccomend it.
I actually did find the Snopes article relly interesting too so heres a link to it : D
http://www.snopes.com/language/literary/askalice.asp

"Go Ask Alice" pages 50-100

This portion of the novel begins with the narrator running away to San Francisco with her best friend Chris. When the two first get to San Francisco they try there best to avoid drugs because of how their previous boyfriends used them as tools in order to sell drugs. The two both get jobs,  the narrator works at a shop for Mr. Mellani and Chris works at a jewelry shop for Shelia. Then after a month or so the two go to a party of Shelia's and get turned on the drugs again, but they both go willingly and simply become closer friends with Shelia mainly because the two lovely the almost nightly parties and because Shelia is currently their only drug connection. Now, they are returning to drugs even though they left their families becuase of how their previous boyfriends used them as tools to sell the stuff,  revealing how the narrator is returning to the substance even with the past, showing the over all anti-drug theme of the book, because their return shows how addictive and hard it is to stay away from drugs, and that even people with good intentions can fall back into there old bad habbits.Then one night when the two of them are raped by Shelia and her current "boyfriend". The two are crushed and mortified to the point where the leave their current place and situation. They have been used and betrayed by a friend again and so they simply leave like they left their home town, which contributes to show the writers thoughts and feelings towards people who do drugs. This being the second time something like this happens to the narrator, showing how the writer believes that most suppliers of drugs are completely untrustworthy and dishonest.

 During much of the narrator's time in San Francisco, the narrator works in a jewelry shop for Mr. Mellani, who begins to act as the father figure she desperatly needs. He invites her to dinner, gives her advice, and even lets her meet his family. The narrator left a same " Thanks and I love you" note just like the one she left her actual family, showing just how much she cared about Mr. Mellani and his family, and how much of a family they actually were to her. Then when two find a new place to live and open a jewelry shop, The narrator uses knowledge she learned from Mr. Mellani which shows how much he taught her. Their shop is some-what successsful, but then the narrator gets homesick around Christmas and returns home. Without Mr. Mellani acting as here family the narrator begins to feel lonely and misplaced because of the lack of parental love and guidance, and she associates Christmas with a time for happiness and family, like many people do, and comes to the realization that she needs to return home to them, showing how childish the narrator still is. She is still young and needs a family to support her, and she still doesn't realize how much she actually NEEDS them, because without them she crashes hard.

The narrator spends the next several days enjoying her family and truely appriciating them(finally). Since she was gone for so long she realized her need for the love and warmth that her family provides for her. The narrator then begins dating a guy named George because he's the "safest kind". She is still in constant fear of being used again, especially since some of her former friends are following her attempting to turn her back on to drugs. She remained clean until, of course, she was turned back on to drugs, again (I think thats the 3rd time now), and her and Chris then start getting drugs from Lane. Then they get busted, and the narrators parents begin to worry about the narrator and watch her like hawks, like any parents narturally would. The narrator gets incredably annoyed by this and one night she gets high and finds herself in Denver. She forgets about all of the great times she first spent with her family. When she first returned to San Francisco she was so excited and releaved to finally return home, but now she left again because of her apparent need for freedom, and drugs. Completely ignoring her desire and actual need for the love and support of a family, you could still say she is the typical "I'm always angry at my parents when they don't agree with me" teenager.

Throughout her time in Denver, the reader sees a completely different side to the narrator. She only has the clothes on her back and her and her new friend, Dorris, now live each day from one fix to another. The both get abused and the narrators diary entries become noticably more angry and bitter in tone and curse words are used in almost every entry, and now she is so desperate for a fix that she even turns to prostitution. She has suck to the lowest point in her story so far, and has almost completly changed in charater, revealing how changable she is at a person. The quiet, insecure that the reader saw has almost completly changed because of her insecurities. She was turned on to drugs because she was finally invited to a party and wanted to belong, but now they have indirectlly led her down this path, showing the tragic path that many addicts take. Now, since she was never sure of who she was or what she wanted at the beginning of the novel, she found this new "goal" and life path of simply living for the next fix, even though it is universally agreed to be a terrible choice and way of life.

"Go Ask Alice" Literary Journal

The novel is entirely written through diary entries of a girl who just turned fiifteen at the beginning of the novel. This allows the read to see the narrators inner most thoughts and feelings. Even in the first fifty pages of the novel, one can see the transformation that takes place in the narrator. She goes from being a self-conscious, lonely fifteen year old to a drug-obessesed teenager whos runs away from home. Through out this you can see how she longs simply for love and attention. She is devastated whenever her crush, Roger, leaves her, and she feels that her family veiws her as worthless, leading to issues with her weight and self-esteam. Then she learns she is moving and is extremly excited for the fresh start, but is still concerned about people in the new town not liking her. Then one day after the move she returns back to her home town and is invited to a party and unknowingly tries LSD after it was given to her in her drink, this signals the beginning of her downward spiral.

She describes the experience as incredable, and can't wait to try more drugs, but most of all it seems that she is just happy that a group of people accepted her. She continues hanging with these people and tries numerous new drugs, and even after her grandfather has a heart attack she continues doing drugs and even loses her virginity, and she finally got the attention from Roger that she was desperate for, but now she isn't as concerned about him, espcially after he goes away to military school, because of her new found curiosity of drugs. In her next relationship with Richie, one can tell she is almost obessed because the two get high every night and she even begins to sell drugs until she realizes the immoralty of it all when she sells to a nine year old boy. She realizes that what she is doing is immoral and then she runs away to San Fransico with Chris, her best friend at the time.