A brave novel of the times, Go Ask Alice attempts to deal with mainly the drug problem with adolescents. Go Ask Alice strives to expose the unseen dangers of the teenage world and the addicting spiral of drugs; in fact Go Ask Alice is far too contrived and too moralistic to provide for a realistic novel. Set from an anonymous 15 year old's diary entries, the novel illustrates the addiction of drugs from LSD to marijuana to heroin, while slowly and slowly our protagonist sinks deeper and deeper into the user world. 
 I've always thought Go Ask Alice was one of those YA classics. I mean there must be a reason for its publication continuing til now, right? Unfortunately I felt horribly let down by its reputation. Go Ask Alice does nothing more than perpetuate a moralistic world. The narration feels flat and weak, and nothing like what a 15 year old would be thinking. Rather the diary is filled with moralizing intentions and wishes to be good, and somehow that will work out. All the while, our protagonist acts as a huge hypocrite, contradicting her own repeated promises. 
 Also, aside from the belittlement in the tone, the novel just doesn't flow. Dialogue is pretty much absent from this series, which is understandable for a diary, but in Go Ask Alice's case it hurts more than helps the novel develop. Sometimes issues that I wanted to be addressed such as: the protagonist responding to peer pressure, physical withdrawal from drugs, or followup on other characters was completely absent from the novel. 
 Go Ask Alice let me down, there was nothing that could have really redeemed the novel, except maybe a valiant failed attempt to explain today's problems. Sad too, Go Ask Alice had such a wonderful potential to change the world. Maybe it has, but still, the novel is poorly written.