Go Ask Alice

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Summary: Alice's wonderland
Review: Alice's wonderland One of the most menacing problems that society is blinded by is drug addiction. Drug addiction, is one of the most prevalent conflicts faced by teens today. Many ponder whether we as a society, are taking the precautions to seize control of this increasing nationwide crises. "Go Ask Alice" is one of the most riveting accounts of a 15 year-old drug addict. The book takes the audience through her life and her reactions to what goes on. Many teenagers may relate to some of the perils she encounters. She is faced with numerous problems and most of which are common. Social obstacles, family, and self-related problems are the three main conflicting points met in her diary. Her family is built on love and respect for one another. Alice was ashamed and thought of herself as the "odd ball." She was jealous of her younger siblings, Timothy and Alexandria. Because of this jealousy, she aimed to cultivate a strong social life. In her first school she felt out of place and awkward. Her parents then decided to move which she found as a fresh experience. She, however, did not take pleasure in her new venue and resided wit her grandparents during the duration of the summer. She attended a party, which was the first step towards her drug dependence. Gradually, she began to get more and more hindered with narcotics. She felt as if this "wonderland" was an escape from reality. With that, she unraveled a dilemma to her already problematic world. This book is an example of how anybody can take one iniquitous turn and find themselves delimited by walls of peril. When Alice is admitted to a mental institution, she relates the institution to a zoo, where the children come and marvel at the animals. The animals represent the wish and want for liberty. In side the mental institution, Alice understands the "wonderland" and how it leads to pure destruction and soon came to identify why she was admitted. The ironic part about this book is, the audience may read and overlook the fact that a part of "Alice" is in everybody and a zoo being ones mind. So do not dismiss all the scrapes young Alice faces. Her decisions did not only impinge on her own well being, but those around her. It is apparent that Alice made many mistakes with her life yet, how did her blunders disrupt those around her? The narrators skirmish with her antagonist Jan, generates problems for not only her well being, but her families as well. Jan threatens Alice in many ways. Jan threatened to familiarize the poison, which is drugs, to her younger siblings. With that, causing her family a greater strife considering Alice realizes how easily addicting narcotics may be. With that in mind, it caused Alice's siblings to be put at risk in many ways. Along with Alice's siblings her father was also threatened. Jan stooped as low as to threaten to plant marijuana in Alice's dad's car. Along with those severe consequences of Alice's actions, were many trivial results. Alice, set false ideas about her parents through her actions. Besides her families misfortune, Alice herself contributed to disperse the drug crises by selling narcotics to younger children to earn money. As a cruel punishment, Alice suffered many dreadful penalties. But by the end of her horrific tale, she changed herself to help others. Although, her imprudent decisions will never be made up, her effort demonstrated her sincerity and sorrow. People today, know drugs are merciless, but then why is it such a massive issue? One hears repeatedly not to do drugs and why not to do so, yet the message not to do drugs is so vital that it is difficult to actually influence many not to do so. As one reads "Go Ask Alice" the consequences and sacrifices that are made after abusing drugs are clear. The truth is always easier to listen to when one hears of the accounts of someone in which the message did not reach and killed. How much more realistic may a story get than "Go Ask Alice." What still seems to amaze me is the book sounds like a psychologist wrote it from his/her extensive knowledge yet it is a true chronicle of a young girl's life. The destruction of Alice's life is a pure tragedy but the person who sent this frightening diary obviously was wishing that through this diary many others may become conscious of how ghastly drugs may be and put Alice's life into consideration. Many readers of this book was familiar with the horrors of abusing drugs, but "Go Ask Alice" paints a picture so clear one can feel her grief. Parents, children, and honestly anybody should read this diary to inhibit this drug crisis. The longer society decides to ignore this dilemma, the ripple effect will surge through every home. Rich, intelligent, poor, uneducated, perfect people are all affected and "Go Ask Alice" proves that fact to be true. Each and everybody may be affected. To ignore this book is a shame and a loss. "Go Ask Alice" was disturbing, yet a pleasure to read.

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Summary: Go Ask Alice
Review: The story "GO Ask Alice" is a real diary but the author has been left anonymous. This story is about a teenage girl, who just turned fifteen, and her life and how it changes due to drugs, sex, and being a runaway. Going through the beginning of high school, Alice didn't have many friends and she was a lonely girl. She was a little jealous of her two siblings Tim and Alexandria. her family moved to a different town and she thought things would be different in terms of being social. It was all the same but she met one good friend, Beth. They were always together but were seperated when Beth was sent to summer camp for six weeks. Alice would be bored through the summer so she decided to stay with her Gran and Gramps. In her old town she met up with some people from her old school. She was invited to a party and that was when it all started with drugs. Alice didn't know at the time but she drank soda with LSD inside. That was her first of many trips. Days later she went on a date and a so-called friend started her on heroin. Bill was also the first of her many sex partners. After this series of events Alice was eager to try more drugs such as acid and pot. While staying with her grandparents, Gramps had a stroke so she decided to stay longer to help out and then flew home. When she arrived home a few days later she got a job and met a girl named Chris. The two girls became close and did drugs together. They became so close that the two ran away together and lived in a little run-down apartment. They struggled with finding jobs but eventually it happened. While in this city two people, Sheila and Mr. Mellani, took care of the girls. They loved Mr. Mellani but they disliked Sheila in the end because they were trying to stay clean from drugs and Sheila's friends got them hooked. later on they started their own business but they left it behind to go back home. Upon their return home their families were happy tok see them and just in time for Christmas. Alice got reenrolled in school but school wasn't as pleasant as Alice hoped. She was disliked because of her past and because she busted her ex-boyfriend Richie because he was a pusher and he cheated on her with a male. She also had sex with Richie. She hated school and wanted to get away. Alice tried so hard all the time to stay clean but it was just so hard. Alice ran away on another occasion. She hitch hiked to Denver and lived on the streets but met a friend named Doris who was malested by her stepfather. Alice and Doris had many acid trips together. Alice once again returned home to her loving family by the help of a kind priest. This time Gran and Gramps got really sick and died within two monthes of each other. It tore up the family but they stayed together. One very important incident changed her whole life. While babysitting for the Larsen family she ate a Peanut Chew. The Peanut Chew had acid on it but she didn't know. She had a very bad trip. She saw her gramps covered in worms and maggots and saw his skeleton. He was trying to save her from the maggots which she flipped out and beat herslef severly. She ripped out her hair, scratched her face up, and ripped off her fingernails. A neighbor heard her screaming and saw her attacking herself. The neighbor locked her in the closet where she banged her head against the walls which gave her fractured skull and a concusion. Alice was treated in a hospital and then her parents decided to send her to an Insane asylum. This book is very powerful which is why i recommed it to teenagers. In fact, i recommend it to anyone. This real diary tells you the story about how drugs take over your life and control your mind and body. One of Alice's own quotes says, "After you've had it, there isn't even life without drugs." This is ironic because she says you can't live wihtout them and it kills so eventually you'll die. It is sad that a young girl my age went through so much before her life even began. Also that she couldn't take control of her life and she was so crazy that it killed her. "Go Ask Alice" was such a great book. It influenced my life in the way that i don't want drugs in my life putting my family through bad things, and ruining my life. Also when your on drugs, you don't know what your doing. Alice had un-protected sex many times and worried of she was pregnant or not. Who wants to live that way? This diary could change lives all over and it shows that drugs arn't cool no matter what. You get hooked and you can't stop. In a way this book brings hope to those who feel like outcasts. That's exactly how Alice felt and getting high and doing other drugs made her feel better. If people see how her life turned out they will go the opposite direction. For those who are headed there, can change seeing the outcome. Basically i recommend this book to everyone because its an eye opener to what the "drug world" can bring. There is a whole lot more that Alice endores, but I'd rather you read the book and find out for yourself.

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Summary: Go Ask Alice
Review: As a choice given to read by my teacher, I was not exactly thrilled to be reading this book. I didn't think I could relate to the story, mostly because of the fact that I am not a drug user. But when I started reading it, I started to enjoy it. It is the story of a girl's problems with drugs. Alice's emotions are like a roller coster ride, going up and down all the time. Every teenager can relate to the story of Alice. The book is intensly realistic and is very powerful. Alice is every teenager you meet. She is a crazy, confused girl who just wants to be accepted. The story shows how easy it is to fall into drugs and alcohol. Alice goes through a lot in the story. As I read the book, I could understand what drug users go through in life and why they do things for drugs. Overall, I recommend this book with great enthusiasm. It is a great story and can really impact a persons life.

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Summary: This is a book you can't put down!
Review: I think that this is the most enlightening book i have ever read. Alice is a girl that has a lot of problems but comes from a good family. When I read this book I felt like I was her. This book is one of those books you don't ever want to end. It will always keep you wanting to read more. When I read this book I didn't want to put it down so sometimes I would stay up to midnight reading it even though i knew it was a school night and i should go to bed. This book tells you how it feels to be high in great detail. This is my favorite book ever and if you read it, it could be yours too!

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Summary: Go Ask Alice
Review: I really enjoyed reading this book. Many emotions that this girl feels are very easy to relate to my own life because these are so true of what a teenager feels. Being a teen myself, I related to the young girl. It was intersting reading about her life, and her experiences and how she handled these hard times. By reading this story, you are living this girls life. These diary entries are so vivid and detailed. You feel her pain and understand how she is feeling, but on a mental level it is hard to read the reality of this girls life, and to see what reality does to her. Through her experiences I have learned no matter how much support you get, YOU need to fix your life because no one else can.

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Summary: A teenagers struggle with life
Review: Go Ask Alice is a book about a teen struggling with drug abuse and pressure from friends. She starts off an everyday clean kid but continues to get more and more influenced by her friends. Soon she is experimenting more often and having many problems with life. I think this is a good book that everyone should read it shows the horrors of extreme drug use and how people act in the real world. Alice has problems with her family and friends, which many people do. I think this is a book that many readers might be able to relate to because it deals with many of life¡¯s problems. Also it is very interesting to read about all the things this one girl went through in only two years. This book provides a good message about teen drug use and has a powerful message as to what can happen from it.

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Summary: English 9H - My Recommendation
Review: I would definitely recommend Go Ask Alice to other people. This book is definitely one for teenagers, but because it is written through a girl's point of view, I think a girl will have a better time relating to the different situations. This book is about a girl who was addicted to drugs and eventually lost her life. It is a true story that takes place in the 1960s. This book shows the harsh reality of what a teenager must go through during their life. This story is told through a young girl's diary. Throughout the book she has struggles with herself, society and drugs. The book's ending delivers a powerful message of what can and does happen somewhere "in the real world," each and every day. The book was a frightening wake-up call to me when I read it. I couldn't believe some of the things that she had written in her diary. As you read the book you can feel how the author changes as she slips into the horrifying and lethal drug world. You can see how her use of language changes as she goes from a normal teenager to crazy and out-of-control drug addict. At certain points of the book, I was terrified. The images were described so vivid and clearly.

Before reading this book I didn't know much about drugs or the lasting effects that it had on people. Reading this book made me feel like I was right there with her, throughout her struggles. I never knew what life was like for a drug addict and what a struggle it is for them to survive.

I am a teenager and I know what it is like to be left on the outside and wanting to so desperately to fit in. Luckily I was stronger than this girl. I was able to resist drugs and peer pressure. I know a few people who did and still do drugs and I saw first hand what it did to them.

The book begins with the girl being 14 years old. She was living in a perfectly stable home. She had everything. She just didn't realize it until it was gone. Her mother, father, sister, Alex, and brother, Tim, loved her very much. Her first taste of drugs is at a party. They decide they were going to play a game called "Button, Button, Who's Got the Button?" The girl doesn't find out what the game is until it was over. The object of the game was to see who got the 10 out of 14 of the bottles of coke with LSD in them. The girl had ended up with one of the bottles and she tells her diary the way she felt while being high.

Her next diary entry talks about her wanting so bad to try pot. This is the start of the young girl's downward fall to disaster. She eventually does try pot, and many other drugs too, such as Speed and heroin. Not only does she use the drugs, but also she begins to sell them to kids her age and even younger. She does it for her boyfriend at the time, whose name was Richie.

Her mental depression adds to her usage of drugs. She is depressed because she does not respect herself. She does not care about her body while she is on drugs. She finds herself to be unattractive and not likable, so she turns to drugs to make her feel better about herself. As the drugs take over her life more and more, she begins to have sex with many men, and it doesn't really seem to bother her. It wasn't until she met the woman in the park, that she decided want she wanted to do with her life.

After being busted once, and running away from home twice, the author decides to turn her life around. She wants to become a helper to children who are thinking about trying drugs. She begins to study a lot and her grades in school begin to rise. She seemed to be on the way to a healthy recovery. The part of the book that terrified me the most was when she was sent to the hospital after giving herself self-inflicted wounds throughout her body. It is a haunting image of her bruised and battered body. I felt sick after finding out that what happened to her. It was a result of someone putting bad acid onto peanuts while she was baby-sitting an infant.

After being sent home from the insane asylum she began to do things normal teenagers do. She met new people who liked her for who she was. Unfortunately we are told in the epilogue that two weeks after she decided she wasn't going to start a new diary, that she died from an accidental overdose or a premeditated overdose. It never tells you for sure what happened.

What surprised me was that the girl's parents never gave up on her. They were always there for her when she needed them. They came and picked her up after she ran away. They supported her while she was trying to give up drugs.

I can definitely see why this book has impacted and inspired so many people for such a long time. I thought that because this was written before I was born, that I wouldn't be able to relate to or understand the issues that she was going through. To my surprise, I did understand it. It was one of the best books that I have read. The only thing in the book that I never really did understand was who is Alice? Was she someone that people related to during that time period? Was she just a symbol in the book?

As much as it may have impacted people, it is only one of the many horrifying stories of drug addicts that don't make it to see their twentieth birthday.

I hope everyone enjoys this amazing book!

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Summary: Excellent Book!
Review: This is now my favorite book! It exposes the truth behind drugs, people, and what drugs do to people. This book tells it like it is even though it's outdated slang of the 60's. I'd reccomend it to any one who can read!

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Summary: Go Ask Alice-Persuasive essay
Review: Can you imagine having drugs control your life, running away, not knowing where you are going, and what you are doing? That is what it is like for a teen girl being dragged into the world of drugs. Go Ask Alice is a notable and powerful book. It is a real diary that takes you through a year or more of an everyday girl that gets seduced into this unknown world called drugs. In the beginning of the book, the main character, (we not knowing her name) is a completely normal girl growing up in a middle class family. She attends an average school, has normal friends, lives in a common house with a normal family, experiencing a harmonious teen life. Like most teens she becomes curious about drugs. She wonders what it would be like to experiment with pot and any other drugs she can get a hold of. After having to move because of her father's job, the main character has to make new friends and survive a brand new high school. Jill, a potential new friend, that attended her old school, asked "Alice" to a party where they drugged her soda with a substance called LSD. The following day of the party, she was hooked and had to have more drugs that gave her titillation like she had just experienced. This sensation drives her into an addiction that changes her world entirely. The protagonist of the story can't get the notion of drugs out of her mind. She makes different friends that drive her compulsion to these puissant substances ever stronger. She meets a friend, Chris and they meet new boyfriends that attend college and soon they find themselves selling drugs. She and Chris runaway together to San Francisco to try to stay clean and start a new life. A coworker of Chris invites the two girls to a party. There they drug the two girls, introduce them to heroin, and rape them. Shortly before Christmas, Chris and "Alice" return to their homes to visit their families and soon the struggling heroine is starting to enjoy her new life at home Once again "Alice" runs away to Oregon to try to start another new life. She stays in a home with a couple of other kids who then desert her and she soon finds herself living on the streets. After finally realizing that this isn't how she wants to live her life, she once again returns home. In just a few days the main character makes a new life for her. She decides that she wants to become a social worker that deals with kids that are addicted to drugs just as she was and who have had the same kind problems she had. Back at home and trying to sort out her life kids find ways to make fun of her whether its making rude remarks, calling her names or playing pranks on her such as putting a burning cockroach into her locker. They even threaten to plant majuanna in her father's car. One day while babysitting she eats a chocolate covered peanut that is really the harmful acid that was covered in chocolate. She has a hallucination of maggots and worms crawling all over her. She begins to dangerously beat herself severly, banging her head on the wall causing a concussion. She lands herself in a hospital and from there she finds herself in a mental institution to help her with these problems. There she meets a 13-year-old girl named Babbie that also suffers from a drug addiction. After spending a lot of time together, the two girls find help from each other. After her she is released she makes new and beneficial friends, Joel and Fawn, that respect her for who she is now, not who she used to be a couple months ago. At the end of the book the main character of the book dies of an accidental drug overdose. I recommend this book to anyone whether you don't do drugs, you do do drugs or you are even thinking about it. Everyone young and old should read this book. It really takes you into someone else's world that is totally different from yours or into a world that you can relate. It also shows that life will not necessarily turn out positively. This book tells how one night can mess up your whole life and how someone got it back together. "Alice" is only one of millions of teens that mess up their lives with drugs. It clearly defines why you should not use drugs. It also points out the challenges and decisions that today's teens have to face. Just reading this book will have a big impact on your life and on your thoughts about drugs. It's as if Alice is living 2 different lives and as if you are in Alice's mind controlling her thoughts and decisions. It's as if you are in Alice's mind controlling her thoughts and decisions. It has opened my eyes to the world that is so low and dangerous. This book is more of a reality then just opening a textbook in school and reading about drugs. You can actually see how drugs messed up this real girl's life. It has changed my outlook on drug users and dealers. I believe that "Alice" wanted to make other people happy because she was not happy with herself and that she was trapped in her own life. I personally am not big on reading but I enjoyed this book and am sure that everyone else would as well. This book is a warning to you people about the potent drugs. You will never forget reading this book!

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Summary: Shattered..."Go Ask Alice"
Review: While reading the book Go Ask Alice, I tried to continuously remind myself that it was only a book and that it was not a close personal friend of mines. This book takes a hold of your emotions as if you were actually part of the story. This book immediately grabs the attention of the reader. It is an extreme reality check, and every teen, regardless of age, gender, background, or ethnicity can relate to something in this book in one way or another. This book demonstrates the everyday life of a teenager girl who is trapped in a chaotic world surrounded by drugs. In my eyes the whole message was that of drugs taking over someone's life and also the fact that even though it was in the 60's, till this very day drugs and self-destruction are still in affect. There is not much difference between the novel and everyday life, besides the fact that many of us are not aware of the things that may happen in real life.

People should always be aware of their surroundings, friends and choices. As they say, "The choices you make today, will affect your life in every way." It is important that we teens fill our lives with positive influences and maintain ourselves in perfect control of our young lives. In "Alice's" case she continued to get involved with the wrong people and eventually it caught up with her in the worst way possible, DEATH, but it could've been prevented...

There is not much else to say, the book was great, but it is not the only case of a young teen who has ever died from using drugs. The only difference was that this diary was in print and got published. Hopefully that will make all the difference, maybe the readers of this book will then realize how precious life is and what a waste of time it would be to spend all of your time slowly killing yourself, both inside and out from the use of drugs.