Go Ask Alice was never a real diary. Neither was the book that came after it. Here is who wrote them, and why the women who read them at thirteen still cannot agree on what that changes.
By Pam Fournier, Reading Vintage
I made a video about Go Ask Alice, and the comments did not sort themselves into agreement. They sorted into three camps.
Some women found out it was fiction and felt personally lied to. Some found out and shrugged. And some told me they never believed it in the first place, and read it anyway.
Fifty years on, not one of those camps has moved.
So here is the plain part first. Go Ask Alice was published in 1971 and presented as the real diary of a real teenage girl. It was not one. A woman named Beatrice Sparks wrote it.
She wrote another one too, eight years later. That is the part fewer people know, and it is the harder story.
Here is what I am willing to state as fact, and nothing past it.
Beatrice Sparks lived from 1917 to 2012. She wrote Go Ask Alice, published in 1971, and Jay's Journal, published in 1979.
She did not present herself as the author of either one. She presented herself as the editor, the woman who had come into possession of real teenage diaries and was passing them along so other kids might learn something.
United States Copyright Office records list her as sole author on all but two of her books.
She also did not hold the psychology credentials she publicly claimed. To me that is the heavier part, heavier than the fiction. The credentials are what made a scared thirteen year old believe she was reading a warning from an adult who knew things.
This group believed it completely, and finding out landed like a betrayal from a person, not a correction from a publisher.
One woman put it this way. "When I read it as a teen I 100% thought it was real. When I found out I have to say I felt a little betrayed and manipulated."
Another gave me her exact age. "I just read in a new book what really happened, geeze I felt so lied to and betrayed. I was 13 years old."
Somebody else was blunter about the cost. "I read it when I was about 12 and it traumatized me for years. I was freaking ticked off when I found out it was fake!"
And one woman described the moment it fell apart, which was not a news story or a documentary. It was her own rereading. "The first time I went back to it and read it as an adult I immediately realized it wasn't real. it made me feel naive and I was disappointed having been lied to."
That word naive keeps turning up, and I think it points at the real injury. A twelve year old took something seriously. Decades later she found out the grown ups were in on something she was not.
Then there is a whole other set who found out and were completely unbothered.
"I didn't care. True or not it was a good book," one wrote.
Another answered the question before I could finish asking it. "Totally bought it a real. Does it disappoint to find out? Nope... still a good story."
A third said the same thing from a different angle. "I read it when I was 12/13ish...I thought it was real but I don't care that it's not"
And one made the whole group's argument in two sentences, which is that the effect was real even if the diary was not. "I read it as a teenager and it scared the crap out of me just like Looking for Mr. Goodbar. Real or not those two books had a lifelong effect on me."
One version of this is not shrugging at all. "My friends and I wrote a play based on that book and performed it for health class in 7th or 8th grade. Think I found out it wasn't real in my 20s, so I reread it. It was a very different read as an adult."
She built something out of it. Finding out who wrote the source material does not un-build that.
This is the group I did not expect, and it is larger than I would have guessed.
"I knew it was fictional. It was in the YA section of my bookstore," one woman wrote. She did not need anybody to reveal anything. The shelf told her.
Another said it was an open argument at the time, among actual teenagers. "As a teen in the 70s I suspected it wasn't real, my friends and I debated it a lot. However, it still scared me enough to stay away from drugs."
Another remembered a whole crowd being in on it. "I was a teenager and we knew it wasn't true. We still liked it, but VC Andrews was also thrust upon us. That was a messed up series. Flowers in the Attic. Strangeness overload"
One was simple about it. "I read it and I loved it but never believed it was real"
And one is still not sure what she believed, which may be the most honest answer of all. "I remember . I'm not sure recall thinking that it was a true story.....But it did prevent me from hitchhiking and trying hard drugs"
Read that last part again. She is telling me the book worked on her without her ever believing it.
Then one woman landed in all three camps at once. "I read it. Loved it. I was mad when I found out. I still love it."
I am not going to rank these three groups. They are three honest answers to a question that does not have one.
Go Ask Alice is the one everybody talks about. Jay's Journal is the one that should be talked about more.
It came out in 1979 and was built and presented the same way, another found diary from another troubled teenager.
This time there was a real diary underneath it. It belonged to Alden Barrett, a sixteen year old who died by suicide. His mother gave the diary to Sparks in good faith. His family learned the book existed when a neighbor told them about it.
That is as far as I will take it, because that is somebody's son and not a fun fact.
The first book invented a girl. The second one used a boy who had actually lived. She faked both of them, and only one of them cost a family anything.
This is the part I can actually help with.
One woman told me, "I've read it at least 4 times since I was 14 and I'm 63 now." Another wrote, "I'm sooooo grateful u reminded me of THIS! Will be re reading it asap"
If that is you, here is what fifteen years out hunting sales taught me about going back for a 1970s paperback.
Decide what the copy is for. Reading it, shelving it, and replacing one you lost are three different purchases.
Check the binding before anything else. These were glued, not sewn. A copy that was read hard in 1974 may not survive being read again in 2026.
Expect brown pages. Tanning is chemistry, not damage. A tan page is still a page.
Look for the cover you remember. For a lot of readers the artwork is the memory, not the text. If a listing does not show the front clearly, ask before you buy.
Buy from a listing that says what is wrong with it. You cannot hold the book through a screen, so the listing has to do the holding. Exactly as described and photographed is the whole job.
When you are ready, the vintage paperbacks are the place to start. Vintage does not restock neatly, and there is no reorder button on a fifty year old paperback.
Q. Was Go Ask Alice a real diary?
No. It was published in 1971 and presented as the real diary of a real teenage girl, but Beatrice Sparks wrote it. She presented herself as the editor who had discovered the diary rather than as its author.
Q. Who was Beatrice Sparks?
Beatrice Sparks lived from 1917 to 2012 and wrote both Go Ask Alice and Jay's Journal. United States Copyright Office records list her as sole author on all but two of her books. She did not hold the psychology credentials she publicly claimed.
Q. Did she write more than one fake diary?
Yes. Jay's Journal followed in 1979 and was built and presented the same way. That one used the real diary of Alden Barrett, a sixteen year old who died by suicide. His mother gave Sparks the diary in good faith, and the family learned the book existed from a neighbor.
Q. Why did so many readers believe it?
Because it was presented as edited rather than written, by a woman claiming psychology credentials she did not have. A teenager reading it in 1974 had no reason to doubt the adult on the copyright page.
Q. What should I check before buying a 1970s paperback copy?
Check the binding first, because these were glued rather than sewn and a heavily read copy may not survive another full reading. Expect browned pages, which is normal at this age. Confirm the cover art matches the edition you remember, and buy from a listing that names its flaws.
Nobody rereads a book four times over fifty years because the sourcing held up.
They reread it because of where they were sitting the first time. Because of who handed it to them. Because of what they were afraid of at twelve.
Beatrice Sparks invented a girl and handed her to a generation. That generation grew up and got angry, or shrugged, or said they knew all along. Three answers, no winner, still going.
But every one of those women can tell you exactly where she was when she read it.
That part nobody made up.
Author Bio: Pam of Reading Vintage
Pam is a vintage bookseller and owner of Reading Vintage, where I find and sell vintage books, ephemera, and collectibles.
I have been out hunting sales for fifteen years, five of them as co-owner of an estate sale company. I am not a rare book dealer and I am not grading anything for investment. I am a reader with a good eye who tells you honestly what a book is and what shape it is in.
Then you decide whether it is the right copy for you.
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