Dangerously Alice [Hardcover]

Phyllis Reynolds Naylor (Author)

Book Description

Series: Alice | Publication Date: May 8, 2007

Alice has always tried to be a decent person. She gets good grades, comes home on time, and has never really given her dad and her stepmom any reason to worry. But now that junior year of high school has started, Alice is a little sick of people assuming she's a goody-goody, so she decides to start shaking things up. First there are the dates with Tony, a cute senior who's a lot more experienced than Alice. Then the fights with her stepmom about the new cat, the car, and everything else start. But when Alice sneaks off to a party that her parents don't know about and a near-tragedy follows, she starts to realize every choice has a consequence, and danger rarely leads to good ones.

Funny, realistic, and always provocative, Phyllis Reynolds Naylor does it again, proving that she understands what real girls think and feel, with this twenty-second book in the beloved Alice series.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Mistakes and quarrels, big and small, drive the plot in the twenty-second novel in the popular Alice series about coming-of-age now. In high school, Alice, 16, is preparing for the PSATs, but what really worries her is that some members of the mean, popular crowd have labeled her Miss Goody Two-Shoes. Are they right? That may be why she risks going home with hot Tony, who, condom ready, tries to go all the way. Is he just adding her to his long list? And anxious to escape that dull, good-girl image, she is sorry to find herself acting mean toward slow, needy student Amy. At home what makes Alice feel really bad is her shameful invasion of privacy when she inadvertently eavesdrops on Dad and her stepmom having sex. The dialogue is right-on, and whether it is the risk of irresponsible teen driving or the farce of her older brother's mix-up with his girlfriend, teens will love the funny, honest, nonmessagey drama on the edge. Hazel Rochman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

About the Author

Phyllis Reynolds Naylor includes many of her own growing-up experiences in the Alice books. She writes for both children and adults and is the author of more than one hundred and thirty-five books, including the Alice series, which Entertainment Weekly has called "tender" and "wonderful." In 1992 her novel Shiloh won the Newbery Medal. She lives with her husband, Rex, in Gaithersburg, Maryland.  Visit Phyllis online at alicemckinley.wordpress.com

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: Atheneum Books for Young Readers (May 8, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0689870949
• ISBN-13: 978-0689870941
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 4.8 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.9 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,286,403 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I guess I've been writing for about as long as I can remember. Telling stories, anyway, if not writing them down. I had my first short story published when I was sixteen, and wrote stories to help put myself through college, planning to become a clinical psychologist. By the time I graduated with a BA degree, however, I decided that writing was really my first love, so I gave up plans for graduate school and began writing full time.

I'm not happy unless I spend some time writing every day. It's as though pressure builds up inside me, and writing even a little helps to release it. On a hard-writing day, I write about six hours. Tending to other writing business, answering mail, and just thinking about a book takes another four hours. I spend from three months to a year on a children's book, depending on how well I know the characters before I begin and how much research I need to do. A novel for adults, because it's longer, takes a year or more. When my work is going well, I wake early in the mornings, hoping it's time to get up. When the writing is hard and the words are flat, I'm not very pleasant to be around.

Getting an idea for a book is the easy part. Keeping other ideas away while I'm working on one story is what's difficult. My books are based on things that have happened to me, things I have heard or read about, all mixed up with imaginings. The best part about writing is the moment a character comes alive on paper, or when a place that existed only in my head becomes real. There are no bands playing at this moment, no audience applauding--a very solitary time, actually--but it's what I like most. I've now had more than 120 books published, and about 2000 short stories, articles and poems.

I live in Bethesda, Maryland, with my husband, Rex, a speech pathologist, who's the first person to read my manuscripts when they're finished. Our sons, Jeff and Michael, are grown now, but along with their wives and children, we often enjoy vacations together in the mountains or at the ocean. When I'm not writing, I like to hike, swim, play the piano and attend the theater.

I'm lucky to have my family, because they have contributed a great deal to my books. But I'm also lucky to have the troop of noisy, chattering characters who travel with me inside my head. As long as they are poking, prodding, demanding a place in a book, I have things to do and stories to tell.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Alice Again, June 26, 2007

By 

kaduzy - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Dangerously Alice (Hardcover)

In the latest installment of Naylor's Alice series, Alice finally goes into the "teen rebel" mode that every adolescent experiences in one way or another. This book finds her riding a motorcycle with a stranger (and without a helmet!) during school hours, going the furthest sexually that she's ever gone with a boy, and having her first real fight with her stepmother, Sylvia.

Usually, Naylor really hits the mark when it comes to putting herself into the head of a teenaged girl -- however, I believe that in this book, she's hit her first major stumble. For one thing, Alice is far more self-aware than any teen I've ever known. During her fight with Sylvia, she realizes how unreasonable she's being, and she apologizes almost immediately. During the motorcycle ride, she keeps thinking how stupid it is to have accepted the ride, instead of just hanging on and enjoying it. I believe 16-year-old girls are perfectly capable of self-awareness, but I also know from personal experience that extreme selfishness trumps all of that in the teenaged mind. When I was 16, I always thought I was right when I started fights with my mother, and it usually didn't occur to me until long afterward when I made a poor, or dangerous decision. This is the same behavior I've observed in other teens even as I grew older. (I'm 24 now.) It would have been nice to see this kind of self-righteousness in Alice, but it seems that Naylor has put the task of teaching her readers a bunch of heavy-handed lessons ahead of accurately portraying the thoughts and feelings of a teenaged girl. She even stumbles with Alice's vocabulary. I have never known a 16-year-old, no matter how advanced they are academically, to use the word "shall" in casual conversation.

However, I don't think these lessons (which include the dangers of driving under the influence and the importance of having feelings for the person you have sex with for the first time) are so overbearing that they distract from the story. I suspect that most readers will be too young to realize they're being taught something as they read, and I generally agree with most of the points Naylor is making. And then, there's the ending. The final few pages of this book put a gigantic smile on my face, a smile of pure happiness for Alice. It's definitely the best ending to any of the books in this series so far, and it went a long way towards redeeming the book for me.

I know I'm much too old to really be considered part of the core audience for these books. I started reading them when I was the same age as Alice, but I grew up faster than Naylor could write, apparently! :-) Nevertheless, I can't stop myself from taking my annual peek inside this girl's life, just to see how it's treating her. So far, Alice is faring quite well indeed, and I will eagerly anticipate the next book in this series.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This one will probably go down as one of the best., May 7, 2007

By 

Nia Mia - See all my reviews

This review is from: Dangerously Alice (Hardcover)

I just finished the book, and all I can say is "Oh. My. Goodness." I don't want to give away too much, but I will give you bullet points to mull on: Tony and Alice(WHOA), Alice and Sylvia(sad, but about time!), a scene involving Alice hiding in a closet(I was rolling with laughter), and the ending(I jumped up and down on my bed for about a half hour yelling "Yes!" over and over). These are just a few of the things that go on in the book, that made me want to start reading it all over. It's one of the best plots in the series yet. There is not one Alice fan, who is going to want to miss this. It really was worth the wait and the money. You'll be begging Phyllis to come out with the next installment much sooner than expected. I hope everyone has as much fun reading it as I did. I'm not too worried, though. You will ^_^

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good but Gross, June 1, 2007

A Kid's Review

This review is from: Dangerously Alice (Hardcover)

I love this book! It's wonderful! I have only one recommendation: Unless your very mature for age, don't read it until your at least 14. There are some things in there that aren't appropriate for younger kids. Otherwise, it was the best I've ever read! Read it!