A PopSugar Best New Books of 2021 Selection
Weed inspires her. Acid shows her another dimension. Ecstasy releases 
her. Nitrous fills her with bliss. Cocaine makes her fabulous. Mushrooms
 make everything magical. Special K numbs her. Crystal meth makes her 
mean. Sixteen-year-old Samantha, raver extraordinaire, puts the “high” 
in high school. 
A ’90s time capsule buried inside a coming-of-age memoir set against the
 neon backdrop of the San Francisco Bay Area's rave scene, Raver Girl
 chronicles Samantha’s double life as she teeters between hedonism and 
sobriety, chaos and calm, all while sneaking under the radar of her 
entrepreneur father—a man who happened to drop acid with LSD impresario 
Owsley Stanley in the ’60s. 
Samantha keeps a list of every rave she goes to—a total of 104 over four
 years. During that time, what started as trippy fun morphs into a 
self-destructive roller coaster ride. Samantha opens the doors of her 
mind, but she's left with traumas her acid-fried brain won't let her 
escape; and when meth becomes her drug of choice, things get 
progressively darker. Through euphoric highs and dangerous lows, 
Samantha discovers she’s someone who lives life to the fullest and 
learns best through alternative experience rather than mainstream 
ideals. She’s a creative whose mind is limitless, whose quirks are 
charms, whose passion is inspirational. She’s an independent woman whose
 inner strength is rooted in unwavering family ties. And if she can 
survive high school, she just might be okay.