Literary Analysis

Topics and Events

1.) a) Go Ask Alice was not just a book read for an assignment but almost more of a life-changing experience. It's the story of a young girl's decent into the world of drugs and addiction told through her own personal diary that she kept. Alice, one day, was an average teenage girl who kept to herself and struggled with confidence problems and then the next day a young girl who was slowly getting deeper and deeper sucked in to addiction. Through the diary you can really sense the change in Alice since its written from her very own words, and you become to feel like you know her on a very personal level. She's constantly going back and forth between being sober and influenced until a drug overdose eventually causes her death.
b) Go Ask Alice is the diary of a teenage girl explaining her decent into drugs and how it's a lifetime of struggle from then on.

2.)  Since the book is the actual diary of "Alice" they claim its written by anonymous. So technically, the author chose to write this diary to keep a record of her day to day feelings and to record her life through her own personal diary. In her first diary entry, Alice had no experiences in nearly anything, she simply would talk about what she did that day or what happened at school. As time went on, the more and more drugs we began to try and use on a regular basis, the more extreme and shocking her stories would get.

3.) I have seen the way addiction has affected and ruined lives of not only the addict but also everyone around them from a very personal perspective so books about struggling with addiction are always very easy for me to relate to. Stories of addiction always catch my interest, and this book has always been one of my mom's favorite book so as soon as she told me about it, I was interested in reading it.

4.) I found the book extremely realistic considering its a real life journal of a real life teenage girl. Her conflicts within herself as far as her looks and social status are almost impossible not to relate to being a teenage girl in highschool myself. She was never happy with herself even though she always had people around her who loved and supported her, which is very common in young girls. Although I am completely against drugs and have never  tried any, her addiction was also easy for me to relate to because I've seen addiction ruin the lives of people close to me and how it can completely consume someone's life. A huge part of the story that I cannot stop thinking about was the part when Alice decided to stay with her grandparents for the summer in her home town. This is where she was introduced to her first trip of acid which struck her curiousity and tempted her to try more and more drugs. The small decision to go stay with her grandparents for a few months completely changed her life and her morals, which ultimately lead to her death. It's crazy to me to think that making such a decision can result in changing your fate.

People

1.)  Alice would describe the people she wrote about and what she thought of them through their actions. In every relationship she made throughout her short life, she was disappointed in how people turned out to be. Her expectations were always so high and she always chose to see people as good that she was constantly being let down. She would describe these people as great friends and people when really, through the reader's perspective, the things they were influencing her to do were destructive and selfish. When someone ended up hurting or betraying her she would blame herself  instead of them. Her tone was CONSTANTLY changing, one day she would be extremely happy and the next she would be questioning her very existence.

2.) Because the book is actually a published diary, there weren't very many detailed descriptions on the way  anyone looked. She did describe Sheila, who she met when she ran away to San Francisco with Chris, both physically and how she acted. When Chris and Alice ran away they immediately started looking for jobs, Chris soon found one at a boutique owned by a woman named Sheila who was in her mid 30's. The girls admired Sheila, they thought she was absolutely glamorous having her own store and apartment in the city. She was very tall and had long black hair with pale skin. She lived a luxurious life but turned out to be nothing but scum after introducing the girls with heroin and allowing her boyfriend to abuse them. Alice talked about Sheila in such a way of admiration, it was disappointing to find out she would betray the young girls. Another character that Alice talked about a lot was Chris. She met Chris while shopping at the store that Chris worked in, they instantly became close friends and although Alice absolutely adored her, she proved to be a horrible influence on Alice. Chris introduced Alice to her boyfriend's friend who got both the girls into drug dealing. Chris was a good friend to Alice and cared alot about her but just got them both into a lot of trouble. Chris had a lot of issues at home with her parents which lead to a lot of bad decisions on her part, but she was always coming from a good place and never meant to hurt Alice in any way. A character that Alice would talk about throughout her whole diary was Roger, who first love. He was a very good kid and Alice absolutely adored him. He eventually went off to bootcamp and whenever Alice did something wrong she would think back to Roger and what he would think about the decisions she had been making. She was always so worried about letting him down, and in the back of her mind she just wanted to be the girl that he would want. He was a good kid, who also really cared about Alice, but it just never worked out because of bad timing.

3.) Those three people stood out to me because of the huge effect they had on Alice as a person and as the person she became. Roger kept that innocent side of Alice that was present in the very beginning there at all times, everytime she made a bad decision she would think back to Roger and wonder why she did what she was doing. On the other side of things, in the beginning Alice never felt like she was never good enough for Roger which really effected the way she thought of herself and what she deserved. Chris played a huge role on Alice because they did everything together and faced a lot of traumatic experiences together. Chris introduced Alice to some bad things that resulted in some awful decisions made by Alice but at the same time was also the closest friend Alice ever had. Sheila was important because she taught Alice not to trust anyone, and that looks can be deceiving. You can't trust someone just because they're beautiful and rich.

Style

1.) The author used a journalistic style, since it was written as a diary. Each entry would start with a date and consist of a paragraph or two about her recent thoughts or what had happened that day, following with an entry from a following day. Because this a true story and real diary of a young girl, there are no tools from fiction writing used such as foreshadowing or symbolism.

2.) Brief descriptions of places and people are used along with focusing on action. Since it's being written about the past in a diary, not much dialogue is represented but instead just summaries on what occurred.  The descriptions of the places and people gives a good idea to the reader about who and where these occurrences took place. These really make it personal and relatable because its as if someone is describing their days to you as they would in a normal conversation, where instead you're just reading it in a published journal.

3.) Tone and mood are constantly changing from day to day. Each diary entry consists of a different tone AND mood. Alice would have a great day and would have the most positive outlook on life, focusing on bettering herself and her life and then the next day she would just be totally depressed thinking about one thing and one thing only, using drugs. The tone and mood is expressed through Alice's opinions on the story she shares, which is always obvious through her words.

4.) This book is such a personal journey because you are reading the exact words and thoughts of a girl who never even imagine that people she didn't know would be reading. She simply wrote them down as a way to keep track of time and a way  to express and confide her feelings without having to open up to an actual living person. The reason you get such a close look at her life and her thoughts is because of the fact that she never meant to share this with an audience of any kind.

5.) The book itself is a resource because it was not written intentionally to become a book. It is a diary that got published into a book to let readers enter Alice's world and prove how dark the struggle of addiction can be.

Enduring Memory

The biggest idea that I've taken away from this book is how one small decision can lead to one small mistake that can truly effect the outcome of your life, possibly in a very negative manner. Alice's decision to visit her grandparents for the summer led her to meeting an old friend from school who invited her over to hangout with friends. The decision Alice made to go led her to trying her first drug, unfortunately Alice had a positive experience with LSD expanding her once, non-existant curiousity for drugs. After this, Alice led herself down a quick spiral of drugs resulting in a death from overdosing. Imagine if she would have said no to hanging out that one night, or if she hadn't gone to the grocery store that day where she saw her old friend, she could still be alive. Alice was responsible for the decisions she made when it came to drugs but would she still have made those decisions if she had never been introduced? It's scary to think that such a small thing as saying "yes" or "no" can completely turn your whole life around. 

Another huge idea, the purpose of publishing this diary actually, is how dangerous drugs are and how they do ruin lives. They don't only ruin the lives of the addict but of EVERYONE close to the addict who are constantly worried and fearful. When a person gets too deep in an addiction or habit of using, the drug becomes the most important thing and will ultimately take over their lives. It completely takes away the person they once were and leaves this empty person living for one thing only, which is heartbreaking for the loved ones to see. Alice never admitted she had a problem, even after terrible things happened only because of the drug usage. She never blamed the drugs or herself for doing the drugs when that was the main reason these awful things were happening to her. Up until her very last diary entry she thought she had her usage totally under control but three weeks later she was found dead due to an overdose. It just takes one time of too much to be the last time. Drugs aren't worth it so its important to never get involved. Never take that first hit or trip or shot because one time is all it takes. This message is so important and should constantly be forced upon our youth, and I don't think there's any better way than publishing the thoughts and words of an actual teenage addict to show how serious the consequences can be.