by Lesley Arfin
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Product Description
Dear Diary is a collection of more than ten years of diary entries (based on the hugely popular monthly feature in Vice Magazine) juxtaposed against present-day updates that take us from Lesley Arfin’s middle school years in the early 90s to her clean and sober twentysomething years in New York City. When she wrote about Cynthia Karacas (it’s funny how you remember everyone’s first and last name like that) making her feel "retarded" back in 10th grade, the world was a dark, lonely place and she could see no light at the end of the tunnel. When she discovered heroin, things got even worse. Today, with the perspective that only rock bottom can give you, Lesley looks back on the apocalypse that was adolescence and asks, "What the hell was I talking about?" Lesley’s hilarious updates remind us how heavy it all seemed back then and how irrelevant it all really is in the face of adulthood. When she digs up all her old friends and enemies to get their take on each entry, a whole new perspective is added. Some are eager to apologize, while others are still mad because, "Let’s face it, you were a loser." No matter whom she talks to about the days we all discovered sex, drugs, and rock ’n roll, one thing is abundantly clear: we were ridiculous.
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Average Customer Review:
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:
 Not enough, 2008-12-21
I couldn't relate to this book at all. I mean, I know it's not meant to make everyone go "Omg, that was totally me!" but it was just too far gone. The only thing that made it bearable to read 'til the end -- were the commentaries. And that's not good enough. The drug usage was too much and too prevalent in everything. There was far too little information and detail to patch all the stories together throughout the book, as well.
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:
 Good, but disappointed, 2008-11-29
The concept of this book - seek out the adult versions of the people that you wrote about in your adolescent diary, some of which hurt you, and confront them about the incidence(s) - sounds terribly hilarious. Unfortunately, it wasn't as funny as I had hoped. Nevertheless, it was a solid read for several other reasons, the first of which is that Arfin is a great writer.
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:
Unlikable misfire -- don't waste your time, 2008-11-01
When I first picked up Dear Diary from a stack of vacation reading, I thought it was going to be a funny read. The idea/gimmick is that the author goes through the diary she kept through her teen years, comments on the entries, and tries to track down the people she knew at the time to get their perspective on things.
Once I got a better look at the book, I realized that it was not just for laughs or nostalgia: the author descended into heroin addiction during her teen years, and she uses the diary entries to track her journey into drug use.
The book was a disappointment. The author tries to juxtapose her adult self with her teen self, but she actually comes off as as self-absorbed adult who thinks she's much more interesting than she is. When she tracks down childhood friends (and enemies), she doesn't get much out of them -- nothing you can't experience firsthand by finding your old classmates online and asking them what they remember about you.
It's hard to form a solid criticism of Dear Diary, because there's not enough substance there to critique. It tries to be funny, deep, even a cautionary tale, but it really doesn't hit the mark on any of these things. I was left feeling glad that Arfin got her drug addiction under control, but not so glad that I'd spent time reading her book.
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:
Eh..... , 2008-07-12
I had high expectations when I bought this book and they weren't met. I was expecting a book that ended in an epiphany or was written a little better, I guess. It's an honest book, however, and I did like how Arfin went back to the people she wrote about during her junior high and high school years to get questions answered which is why I have it more than 1 star. What I didn't like is that it all seemed so superficial. It was like Arfin was trying too hard throughout the book to be obscene--not through the original journal entries, but through the follow up conversations.
I think you might like it if you're in junior high or high school. You might be able to relate to a lot of the journal entries than I could being out of high school and away from the drama for so many years. Towards the end, once Arfin starts spiraling down on her heroin addiction, it becomes more real than reading about her first dry humping experience or first kiss.
0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
 If You're Not 16, Don't Bother, 2008-03-25
author is shallow and full of herself...basically, she's the person who just wants to go on and on and on because she likes hearing herself speak.
there is nothing useful or helpful here, the writing is weak, undeveloped, and juvenile; the author seems very proud of herself for what she was involved in--and what info there is of that is very sketchy...even as i was reading this 5-minute story, i found myself wondering why this book was published at all.
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