From France

Question:

Hello! As you can guess, I am a great fan of your Alice books (i wouldn’t email you if I wasn’t)! I want to thank you for writing them, because I really enjoyed reading them (I didn’t read them all because I started with I like him he likes her but i’ll definately read the other ones at some point) I am always looking for some good books to read in english (i am french and i feel it’s a good way to improve my english) and I found exactly what I was looking for in your books. Even though I don’t have a lot in common with Alice I really felt close to her. She is so nice and thoughtful, it really made me think about how selfish I acted sometimes, complaining while doing the laundry or things like that. She is slightly older than me in the last books (I am entering the french equivalent of junior year) and I hope I’ll grow as altruistic as she is! I also have to say, your books really gave me an insight of how american life in the suburbs can je like, and of how an american high school is for an average teenager (and it felt à lot more realistic than some movies :p)
So really I would like to thank you for your books and I’m looking forward to reading the last volume! I was actually wondering if it was going to be longer than thé others, considering that it covers a big part of alice’s life?)
Bye! (as you can see, i don’t really know how to end an email in english :p so i’ll just say i hope you will continue writing great books and enjoying it!)

Phyllis replied:

Yes, the final book in the series will be longer than the others.  I’m not sure of the number of pages, because once it appears in print, it’s much different than the numbered pages in the manuscript.  All I can tell you is that the final manuscript was about twice as long as the usual one I submit.