A brilliantly written and precociously perceptive teen memoir, this book originally published in short form by a small press when the author was 14. The complete work, Zoe’s coming-of-age diary ranting and raving through a year of high school, was published by HarperCollins in 2003.
Zoe’s entries chronicle her tortured search for truth in love and art, her faltering faith in the value of activism in the face of universal apathy, and her bottomless disdain for just about every figure and fixture in her high school life. The language is undeniably raw — a hip mixture of bold statement, cyberesque shorthand, and stream-of-consciousness prose. Her frank accounts of her transgender search for the perfect kiss and her first girlfriend who becomes her first boyfriend will surely shock certain audiences, but also speaks sincerely to the tortured misfits who need to know that they are not alone.

I wrote a story about you. Well, sort of, see, it’s mostly about me. Well, entirely about me, but here’s the catch: I’m you. No, really, I mean it. Not like that transcendentalism stuff we’re learning in English class, but really, truly, I’m you. I know what it feels like when your heart beats so hard against your white bone ribs, when you sing in the shower with soap in your eyes, when you run until you get a side ache. I wrote this story about you because I am so in love with you, your broken-fence teeth and your tissue-paper scars. I love you when you’re so exhausted it could topple you to the ground, so in love it could snap guitar strings, so sickly sweet it could make lips smile. This is a reckless love story. This is my shameless confession.
Also, check out Zoe’s own blog!