Your Questions Answered

When will I Lose My Virginity?

Question:

 

i was wondering what age i would most likely loose my virginity at? i no i still have a pretty long time to go since im only ten years old but i still wonder wat age ill have sex. im guessing maybe 18 but it could take a lot longer. i just wanted to no what u think oh and i love the alice books.

 

Phyllis replied:

 

Are you going to put it on your calendar?  It’s not a matter of age, it’s a matter of maturity.  If this is the biggest thing that concerns you when you’re eighteen, then you still have some years to go before you’re ready.

I Want to be Super Popular

Question:

 

i no ur really good at giving advice so i was wondering if u could give me some. im in the fifth grade and im having popularity problems. im a pretty good student with pretty good grades, a bit above average. and i have plenty of friends but im not miss popularity either. im about average on a popularity scale actually. i wanna be super popular but i dont no how. im nice to my friends and i help them if they need help but i wanna be super popular. please help mrs naylor and lets hope by next time everybody wants to be friends with me. p.s. i love the alice series it is the best series ive ever read!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Phyllis replied:

 

Hmmm.  You’re a pretty good student with above average grades with plenty of friends, yet you want to be Miss Popularity.  Why?  What would that give you that you’re missing now?  And why do I get the feeling that even if you were Miss America, there would still be something missing fromyour life?

Talks up a Storm on the Internet

The Mean Ones

Question:

hi phyllis. i really need help. remember those girls i was telling you about? the mean ones? well i asked why they have a problem with me and we got into this discussion and one of them was sort of being nice to me and i just asked how things were  going for her, meaning everything, and she said leave me alone and actually hates me. the other one wont be friends with me till the other girl and i sort it out, but theres nothing to sort out. we were all like BFFS last year, well one of them was. i am gonna make up names, pam and kate. kate i was friends with last year. i tell myself you dont need them, you dont deserve them, but then i think of all the good times we had, and i wis i could go back to that, but then i dont. sorry about all this, its a mouth full. i just really want to know your point of view.

Phyllis replied:

It happens.  It happens to individual people, it happens to groups, and it especially happens, it seems, in middle school and early high school.  Girls are trying to sort out their own identity, and it’s tied in strongly, for better or worse, with the girls they hang out with.  I sure can remember hanging around with some people with whom I had very little in common, and acting particularly silly. I wasn’t mean to anyone, I was just someone I hardly recognize now, I did such stupid stuff.  That won’t help your problem, I know, but about all I can say is hang in there.  Of course you miss the fun you used to have.  My writing critique group finally stopped meeting after about 26 years, and I miss it horribly.  But people’s life circumstances change, personalities can change, people move away…  Concentrate on making other friends.  Some of these girls will drift back to you, some will drift further away, and you’ll make other close friends, I promise.

Love It So Much!

Question:

 

 

i wanted to say to you a couple of things, i am from israel and in israel not allot of kids read this kind of books like alice
but i love it sosososososo much i can’t even explain, i am 13 and a half and i am so excited to write you!
i love alice so much that i can feel that she is actually my friend!
she is my insperation, i am so excited to open a new book f alic every single time
i wanted to thank you that you made my reading expirience so interestng and fun!
thank you so much,

Phyllis replied:

 

Thank you so much for writing to me.  I know that readers in the U.S. are interested to know that the Alice books are being read in many other countries as well, and that you have written to me from Israel.

Who’s More Important?

Question:

hey phylis i was reading your fan mail page and i wanted to say to the girl that had the guy play games with her heart. I wanted to say that i have been in the receiving end of it and also the giving end of it. I’m not proud of what i did and i bet the boy wasnt either. i felt like crap for it i mean i even kissed the poor dude which was soooooo wrong of me. BUT what i wanted to say was that a boy like that  isn’t worth your time and isn’t worth affecting you like that. I let it affect me pretty roughly and with my personality disorder i became extreamly upset and did some bad stuff but once i felt better im like whose more important in this situation me or him. and i decided it was me just like you should.

Phyllis replied:

If you’re speaking of the guy who kissed, said all the right things, then broke it off the minute he got back home, yes, I agree; she should consider herself and her feelings of primary importance here and not waste her time on him.  But when you treat someone else that way and play around with HIS heart, he’s the one I’d side with, and the least you could do would be to apologize.  Most of us are going to be in both those situations to some degree in our lives.  We will discover we are using certain people to our advantage–we act friendly because they provide a ride/a date/a movie ticket, etc.–and we get them thinking we like them more than we do.  And there will be people who treat us the same way.  We’re often told we should care for the environment and leave as little of a carbon footprint as possible, but we should also do the same with feelings, and leave few footprints on people’s hearts.  (My sermon for the day).

Should I Wait Until I’m About Thirteen?

Question:

i love the alice books and read all of the ones that have been published but i am only 10 years old. ill be 11 in three months but i no im kinda young for alice. im not going to stop reading them because i love them so much!!!!!!!!!!!! do u think i should wait until im about thirteen or fourteen before i read alice in charge next year? thanks so much for your advice i love the alice series and your an amazing author!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Phyllis replied:

 

Well, you are rather young to be reading the most recent Alice books, but if you had no trouble with “Dangerously Alice” and “Intensely Alice,” you can get through “Alice in Charge.”   You will probably get much more out of the later Alice books if you read them again when you’re older.  It’s not that you won’t understand the story now, but by then you will have more of the feelings and emotions that Alice portrays in these books, and the problems she faces will be more real to you.

Only Let Down my Guard 3 Times

When Something comes Back into your Life….

Question:

 

Alice had drifted into my memory over the past year as i travelled Europe. Anyhoo, Then this summer i randomly went to the bookstore and asked if you’d come out with any new books. They said yes and surprisingly they had it in stock. I of course bought it overjoyed that This new book i knew nothing about, i didn’t read the first chapter that you often post on your website. I spent the next two days reading Alice and her adventures with everyone. It was amazing, i went back into this little cocoon where no one knew who i was, i just new alice in my mind and didn’t worry a thing. It sort of got me thinking, can something that’s been out of your life come back into it again and make you look at it differently then you did before? I was about to test my own theory…towards the end of the summer i met up with a guy that had come back into my life in and out after a year of hardly having any contact, we’d been romantically involved, I was very into this boy, however he’s a bit complicated which i knew going into it all the year before, i’d gotten over him in europe pretty successfully, thinking that make it as friends. however this proved false. He bought me a drink, and was way too in-tuned to my every move. Acting like we were dating when we really weren’t. i ended up going against my word and made out with him later, I’m not proud of it, but i was intrigued as to why he made the moves, yes he wanted a lot more then i gave him. he wasn’t pleased either but i wasn’t about to give this kid what he wanted. He’s been in my head a lot recently, hes off in school. I miss him. I hate that i miss him, because i know he’s very likely just going to hurt me, but so far he’s slowly coming around. But i’m sick of getting hurt. I know i’ve somewhat rattled on but having alice come back into my life made me think of that other summer story. I hope fall isn’t over yet where you are. 

Phyllis replied:

 

Well,  you know there’s an old saying (this one referring to marriage) that it doesn’t matter “whom” you marry nearly as much as it matters “when.”  The same thing can be said of someone coming back as a friend/lover/whatever.  If someone enters your life again at a time you feel strong and capable and occupied and happy, you are probably more likely to make a true assessment  of him, his motivation, his value to you, whether you will become a better person because of him, or maybe not.  If he enters your life when you’re feeling a bit at loose ends, a bit lonely or needing a friend, you’re more likely to assess him on the basis of what would make you feel better at the moment.  Obviously he provided some of the latter.  It’s not necessarily bad, and it’s natural to keep thinking about someone who gave you some sexual pleasure/conversation/attention/etc. just as it’s normal to think about a double hot fudge sundae even though you know it’s not good for you.  Keep your perspective, keep asking yourself how/if this person helps you with whatever your goals are for yourself, if he brings out the best in you, and even whether if–he does all these things–he himself is such high maintenance that this may take away the happiness of the rest.

Banned Books

Question:

 
I just wanted to say that I am a huge fan of the Alice books.  I am 25 and I
wish I could say I grew up reading the series, but unfortunately I wasn’t
exposed to them until a few years ago.  I began reading them after a colleague
complained about them being available in the media center (middle school) in
which I worked.  I wanted to check them out for myself and didn’t have the same
reaction as she did.  I was hooked.  I have since read them all and look forward
to each new book. 

I am wondering what you think about your almost regular appearance on ALA’s
banned books lists.  I think it is very sad that some people try to limit what
children are exposed to as a means of “protecting” them.  I see your books as a
tool for helping young readers, both on their own or as a source of advice on
who they can go to for help/guidance.

I would really appreciate your thoughts on this.

Phyllis replied:

I know that our readers very much appreciate your thoughts about some libraries banning the Alice books.  Here’s the deal: since Alice gets older in every book, obviously some of the books are meant for an older audience.  I wouldn’t recommend “Intensely Alice,” for example, in an elementary school library.  So “book selection” isn’t always the same as “banning” a book, though I can imagine that some librarys call it that.  Actually, librarians are some of the most loyal supporters of the Alice books, and defend them if someone wants them banned.  It’s usually parents who want their children kept “pure,” as many parents tell me, “from harmful influences.”  The mother of a ten year old girl was very angry with me for talking about how babies are conceived in Lovingly Alice.  She wrote that since her daughter read that book, “the words penis and vagina will be forever ingrained on her mind.”  Another mother tearfully accosted me because she found the word “condoms” in a novel for teenagers, and said, “My eighth grade son doesn’t know what condoms are and I don’t want him to know.”   Whenever I hear comments like these, my heart really goes out to their children.  Often, when word gets out that a book has been banned from a library, it merely increases sales; people rush out to buy it and see what was so offensive.  But more often than not, librarians successfully keep the books they and readers love on the shelves.  The American Library Association’s list of banned books is only a count of how many times a book has been challenged; it’s not really the actually number of times it’s been removed from the shelves.  Good libraries have a system in place where the protesting adult must read the book he wants banned, write up a report of why, suggest an alternate book, and then his report, plus the library’s defense of the book, go before a committee, and the committee decides whether or not to keep it.  I think it would be a good idea if students were told when a request comes in to ban a book, so that the readers themselves can have a say in it.