Gossip Girl is a young adult novel series written by American author Cecily von Ziegesar. The first book was published in April 2002 by Little, Brown and Company. The series centers on the scandalous lives of privileged teenagers attending elite private schools on Manhattan's Upper East Side, with the story unfolding through the eyes of an anonymous blogger known as 'Gossip Girl' who chronicles their every move.
The novels primarily follow best friends and sometimes rivals Blair Waldorf and Serena van der Woodsen, along with a rotating cast of wealthy, beautiful, and scheming classmates. Von Ziegesar drew inspiration from her own experiences attending the Nightingale-Bamford School, an all-girls private school in New York City, and the stories she heard from friends about the city's social elite.
The original series spanned thirteen novels, concluding in 2009, and spawned a spin-off book series titled Gossip Girl: The Carlyles, which began publication in 2008. The books became a cultural phenomenon among young adult readers, known for their frank depictions of teenage sexuality, substance use, and conspicuous consumption, and they helped define a new wave of aspirational, scandal-driven teen fiction in the early 2000s.