Go Ask Alice is a striking novel. Written anonymously, this book is the diary of a teenage girl. More than four million copies have been sold since it was first printed in 1971. The diary entries span over about two years of her life. They delve into her life as she begins to experiment with drugs. The diarist unknowingly enters the world of drugs, and is quickly sucked in with only a slight chance of ever escaping. Her life turns into a rollercoaster from there, with so many ups and downs. She gets off drugs, but at some point or another she breaks and is unable to resist them. She is addicted.
The girl is not only struggling with her addiction, but her need to be accepted by her peers. Her family moves to a new town and she has to switch schools. It takes her two and a half months to make her first friend. In the beginning none of her classmates talk to her, they simply stare. She tries to bury herself in her books, schoolwork, and music, trying to pretend that she does not care what the others think about her, but it does matter. She writes, “I’m partly somebody else trying to fit in and say the right things and do the right thing and be in the right place and wear what everybody else is wearing.” She even goes on a diet to lose weight. She is insecure and wants to become skinnier, starving herself to have the perfect body. She has to learn to love herself before her peers can do the same.
This novel puts the reader into the middle of an absolutely terrifying, hard-core reality. Misfortune always seems to be piling up, creating a never-ending stack. There is more to the world of drugs than simply getting high; there is a greater universe in which anything horrible can happen. They will clench the user in their grip until they have annihilated the user’s life. Every teenager should read this book at least once because the truth about drugs is so vividly revealed.