Just Finished the Last Book

Question:

I just finished reading the last Alice book and I really felt that I wanted to say thank you. I wanted to let you know how much the Alice series has meant to me.

For my sixth grade English class we were required to pick a book to read and write reading journals on, so I went to my library and asked the librarian for a recommendation. She recommended the Alice series and the other series. Being the typical twelve year old that I was, the first book of the other series was a little shorter than the first Alice book, so of course I went with the shorter one. That series wasn’t as long so when I finished it I moved on to Alice. The minute I started reading it I was hooked and wished that I started with it in the first place.

My mom would check the books out at the library for me several at a time, i would speed through them. Then after I finished all that were published, I waited every year for the new ones to come out. The new ones coming out lined up pretty close to where I was in my life.

Alice taught me so much. Her and her friends were not just fictitious characters in books, I felt like they were real people out there going through real things, much unlike characters of other books I read between Alice books. Alice books taught me real life lessons, and answered many questions, that like the characters in the books, I too was afraid to ask.

I began reading the Alice books when I was in sixth grade and I just finished the last one, during my sophomore year of college. The books really had an impact on my life during those critical years. They taught me a lot about friendship and love and challenges in life.

I was studying abroad when the final book came out and I could not wait until I got back to the US so I could read it. I put it on reserve at the library and when I finally got it, it sat on my desk for about three weeks unopened. It was less of an issue of not having time, and more that I did not want to start the book because I knew it was the end. So this weekend, all of my roommates were away for a long weekend and I picked it up and could not put it down.

I teared up multiple times while reading, happy and sad. The way you portrayed their engagements and marriages, the children being born, and the deaths and tragedies. I really loved the way that Alice and Patrick ended up together in the end. Although I could kind of see it coming, or maybe it was just wishful thinking, I got very nervous when Alice was engaged to Dave. Another thing that I loved about the book and the series all together was that Alice, Elizabeth, Pamela, and Gwen all remained such great friends even though they didn’t all live in the same place anymore. I am two years out of high school and going to college out of state, and so far I have remained close with my buddies back home, but this give me even more hope of that for the future.

I will always remember the Alice series and all that I have learned from it. Hopefully one day, if I am lucky enough to have a daughter of my own, I am going to strongly encourage her to read the series.

Thank you so much for writing these books that, I am positive, have touched the lives of so many girls like me. Thanks again for everything,
 
Phyllis replied:
 
I  hope that you, and all my readers, know how much your emails and letters mean to me.  It’s sad for me, too, that the series is over, and I don’t have another Alice book to write.  But I felt it was time, and because I knew how I wanted the series to end, I needed to get a revised story down on paper.  I love the thought of you wanting to hurry back from overseas to read the final book.  I’m very much enjoying your own reactions to the book, and am forwarding some of readers’ letters, yours included, to my editor.