Your Questions Answered

I’m Completely Serious

Phyllis replied:

I’ll have to take your word that your email is completely serious, because it didn’t seem so to me.  For a group of college girls uninhibited enough to masturbate in front of each other, it’s hard to believe that you want to know if you’re “doing it right.”  How can you say to anyone else “You’re not enjoying chocolate right,” or “You’re not enjoying a sunset right” or “You’re not enjoying your backrub right.”   If you are getting pleasure, isn’t that what it’s all about?   (I answered a similar question just a few days ago).

I Can’t Stop Thinking About It

Phyllis replied:

I would ignore them.  I certainly would not suggest anything that would get a bunch of guys angry at you, and what they really want is a reaction from you.  If you don’t feel safe at the rink, then you definitely need to tell your parents.  But if someone is waiting to drive you home and watching you go in and out, and if otherwise you enjoy skating there, I would simply avoid the guys as much as possible.  If at any time they are really in your face and can’t be ignored, the best thing to do, if you can swing it, is to give them a bored look–not angry, not funny, just a sort of “Ho hum, why don’t you grow up?” look.  What guys do not want to be is boring.

WHY?

What Does It Mean?

Appreciate Your Honesty

Question:

I’m one of those adults who’s been reading your Alice books since I was in middle school. And I still love reading each new one as it comes out. I was looking through your Alice blog this afternoon and I just wanted to let you know that I so appreciate the honest, straightforward way that you answer all the questions you get. I hope when I have children that are pre-teens and teenagers that I will have the guts to show them how much I respect them by addressing their questions and concerns with as much honesty. I don’t always agree with what you say, but man, I honor your choice to be real and to genuinely concern yourself with the issues your readers face. Thank you for giving so much of yourself to the people who love your books.
P.S. I’m also kind of wondering if you have a new Alice book coming out this spring?  I thought there was usually a new one every year, but I haven’t seen a single thing on Amazon or your blog.

Phyllis replied:

Thank you so much for your letter.  If you go to “books”  on Amazon.com and type in “Alice in Charge,” you will see the cover of the new book coming out this June.

Books Per Year

Should I Feel Guilty?

Phyllis replied:

Let’s forget “guilty” for the moment and try to understand why you cuss inappropriately, pull tricks to get out of band, and lie to your mom.  Without knowing either you or your mom, your email seems to indicate that she is much too strict with you and you are reacting passive-aggressively by seeing what you can get away with at school without her knowing, instead of actually confronting her and having a serious talk.  Since you seem to know that the hard-cussing, trick-pulling, hanging-out-with-wrong-crowd person isn’t really you,  think about this:  If you suddenly were given the choice to choose exactly the kind of person you wanted to be at school, doing the kinds of activities you really like, what kind of person would that be?  Would you give up the cussing-persona to be one of the actors in a play?  Would you be the kind of person who might attract the attention of the eighth grade guy across the street?  Would you trade band for modern dance or girls’ soccer?  Who is the real you?  I know that it’s easier said than done for a girl, who is totally dependent on her parents for food and shelter and spending money, to sit down with her mom for a serious talk, but I think that’s what you need to do at a time she is relaxed and in a reasonably good mood.  Promise to listen carefully to the reasons she gives for what she demands from you if she will listen carefully to the way you are feeling.  Tell her that you resent her rules over the small things, like saying “Dude.”   That you resent having an arbitrary age restriction for dating.  That you want to be able to pick your own extra-curricular activities, and that band isn’t one of them.  Tell her that instead of hanging around with kids she probably wouldn’t approve of, and being tempted to ditch band, and using words she wouldn’t like just to get even, you want to become a different sort of person, and you need her help by giving you more freedom.  Then present your plan, and think it out beforehand:  Perhaps you want to trade band for drama club next year; you want to join the chorus or the dance club or soccer or the computer club; you want to have friends in sometimes for pizza and DVDs and you want to include some guys.  The very real fact is that if you continue doing as you are now, your mom is going to find out about it, or sense that it is going on, and will trust you even less.  She will become more restrictive, not less, and you sure don’t want that.  I did some incredibly silly things when I was 12, and I blush now to even think about it.  I hung out with people not at all like me, knowing all the while I could never be serious about them.  And I soon discovered I was turning off the people I really DID want to hang out with.  By eighth grade I had become more the person I really was.  Think about the kind of person you really want to be, the kind of people you hope to attract, and head in that direction.  When your mother sees a growing maturity in you, she is far more likely to offer more freedom.

Do I Need to Read the Prequels?

Seriously Had to Put the Book Down Twice

Question:

I just finished reading dangerously Alice, and I seriously had to put the book down twice when Tony and her….you know….did THAT anyways…i love how you write things about what can happen to a real teenager! but did you actually experience scenarios like this?

Phyllis replied:

Ahem.  Did you seriously expect me to answer a question like THAT?

How Do You Do It?