BEING LOLITA is a stunning coming-of-age memoir of obsession, passion, and manipulation, shining a bright light on our shifting perceptions of consent, vulnerability, and power. This is the story of what happens when a young woman realizes her entire narrative must be rewritten―and then takes back the pen to rewrite it.

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“Have you ever read Lolita?”

So begins seventeen-year-old Alisson’s metamorphosis from student to lover and then victim. A lonely and vulnerable high school senior, Alisson finds solace only in her writing―and in a young, charismatic English teacher, Mr. North. He praises her as a special and gifted writer, and she blossoms under his support and his vision for her future.

Mr. North gives Alisson a copy of Lolita to read, telling her it is a beautiful story about love. The book soon becomes the backdrop to a connection that blooms from a simple crush into a forbidden romance, with Mr. North convincing her that theirs is a love affair rivaled only by Nabokov’s masterpiece. But as time progresses and his hold on her tightens, Alisson is forced to evaluate how much of that narrative is actually a disturbing fiction.

In the wake of what becomes a deeply abusive relationship, Alisson is faced again and again with the story of her past, from rereading Lolita in college, to working with teenage girls, to becoming a professor of creative writing. It is only with that distance and perspective that she understands the ultimate power language has had on her―and how to harness that power to tell her own true story.

Praise

"Being Lolita is an unflinching depiction of grooming and a searing indictment of exploitative teachers, but most of all it’s an act of redemption—a powerful realization of Wood’s vow 'to do the little I can to make sure what happened to me doesn’t happen again.'"
—Susan Choi, author of the National Book Award-winning Trust Exercise

“It would be easy to summarize Being Lolita as a memoir about a toxic, exploitative relationship between a high school English teacher and his student, and it is about that—but it’s about that in the way Walden is about a pond, or Let Us Now Praise Famous Men is about sharecroppers. Which is to say, it’s also about so much more. It’s about narrative itself—the poly-edged blade of storytelling, how it seduces and distorts and justifies; how it liberates and unsettles; how it settles like fog but also pierces through obscuring mists with the chill sunlight of something uncomfortable getting discovered. It’s a book about the way stories can feel like straitjackets and also like exhalations; how we can lose or find ourselves in them—sometimes both at once.”
—Leslie Jamison, author of The Recovering and Make It Scream, Make It Burn, in The Paris Review.

"A chilling and propulsive debut about the danger of being captive inside someone else's story, and the power of choosing your own."
—Melissa Febos, author of Whip Smart and Abandon Me

"In Being Lolita, Alisson Wood traces one story of a teenage girl falling in love with her teacher, and then traces it again through the open lens of time and reflection. Each click of the aperture in this beautifully told memoir lets in more light, until the clouds of the past begin to part, allowing an image of a young woman to form on the page that is not fated to simply suffer at the hands of her abusers, but is able to break through the glass and live a life she can call her own."
—Hannah Tinti, author of The Twelve Lives of Samuel Hawley

“Wood reminds us that stories still have the power to change the world. This is a fascinating story of survival and purpose, yet it is also a story of interpretation. How we read the world changes how we live in it. A fantastic debut.”
—Garrard Conley, author of Boy Erased

“It is incredible that Alisson Wood can write a story of such brutality and still make room for hope. But she does. Wood’s debut is a celebration of survival, teaching us that in the end, we are the most reliable narrators of all, the hero of our own stories. BEING LOLITA is an incisive reckoning, a work of art, a new education.”
—T Kira Madden author of Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls

“I read the final page and immediately turned to the first page and began the book all over again...because I wasn’t ready to break the spell of Wood’s voice. The structure of this book—the way the story is told—is so perfect and striking. In fierce and urgent prose, this is a deeply moving coming-of-age tale, in which a young woman comes to understand herself, and her enormous strength and intelligence, and regards her younger self with such tenderness and compassion. It’s truly a memoir for the ages and unlike anything else out there.”
-Joanna Rakoff, author of My Salinger Year

"Being Lolita is a book of rare resonance, simultaneously heartbreaking and hopeful in its ongoing desire for a world of integrity, sanity, and respect. You won’t forget it any time soon."
—Paul Lisicky, author of Later: My Life at the Edge of the World

“Since the #MeToo movement spotlighted predators in Hollywood, journalism, and beyond, a number of memoirs have taken stock of how power dynamics can shape—and exploit— an array of relationships, including platonic ones between teachers and students… Alisson Wood… adds to this growing canon with a chronicle of her two-year relationship with her high-school English teacher.”
—Evette Dionne, “17 Memoirs Feminists Should Read in 2020”, Bitch Media

"Being Lolita is a book of deep insight and bravery—and ultimately one of power. In the era of #MeToo, Wood’s voice will change things for the better."
—Darin Strauss, bestselling author of Half a Life

"The way Wood revisits her younger self, recounting the multitude of deep feelings and reviews them again with critical honesty as an adult makes the memoir feel as if it is being written in real-time; it is a remarkable feat of self-awareness…Wood’s memoir is a triumph over heartbreak, trauma, and metamorphosis.”
—Rachel Gonzalez, “Alisson Wood Writes Through Pain, Love, and Lessons Learned in ‘Being Lolita”, Paperback Paris

“Wood debuts with an unflinching account of her high school affair with a teacher… It’s an impressive, provocative outing.” 
—Publisher’s Weekly’

"Deeply rich in language and perspective, Being Lolita is a haunting page-turner that puts readers on the edge of their seats, much like the original Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov. Wood is a talented writer and engaging narrator, bravely sharing her story in the most eloquent of ways. You will never read Lolita the same again. 5 stars," The San Francisco Book Review

“Enacting the very structure of Nabokov’s novel, Wood explores the parallels between her relationship and Dolores Haze’s and expertly plays into this titillating trope: an illicit affair between teacher and student. However, Wood does not stop at mere mimicry. In her resonant and impressionistic prose, Wood dismantles the fantasy showing its underbelly.” — The Columbia Review