Absolutely Maybe is a novel by author Lisa Yee. The story follows the main character, Maybelline "Maybe" Chestnut, as she runs away from her home in Kissimmee, Florida for Hollywood. Maybe is the daughter of a beauty queen turned charm school proprietor. Although her mother screams everything beauty queen, Maybe is the direct opposite with her Goth makeup, baggy clothes and brightly-colored hair that changes throughout the novel.

When Chessy, Maybe's mother, chooses her fiancé and soon-to-be seventh husband over Maybe, Maybe runs off to find her biological father in California. Maybe takes along her best friend, Ted, as they hitch a ride with their friend, Hollywood, who is driving out to attend film school at the University of Southern California, USC.

When the trio arrives in California, things don't work out quite the way they planned. Ted and Maybe, at first, are homeless and so they are sleeping in the lounges of the college dorms. Ted eventually lands a job as a personal assistant to a Hollywood star, so he moves on to realize his dream of dealing with the rich and famous. Hollywood starts to realize his dream of becoming a movie maker, propelling his dream into reality when he wins a documentary film contest with his documentary about Maybe.

The only one who is still struggling is Maybe, who is the reason that they go to California in the first place. As she works at a taco truck for the summer, she continues to search for her father and lives with one of her mother's ex-husbands that Chessy married twice, Sammy. By the end of the novel, Maybe realizes that life doesn't always turn out how you want it to and so it's best to learn how to work with what and who you have in your life.