Being inside of her head and thoughts are so sad. She falls in love with two more boys.. The outcome of the whole book is sad and sweet at the same time. Makes me sad. Sad for so many out there that face life in the wrong ways, or it faces them in the wrong ways. I was one of them, but in a different way. This is a trilogy and I'm anxious to read the other books and I'm scared at what will happen. I hope something nice. View all 9 comments.
An immensely powerful book, Crank brings us a heartbreaking downfall into drug addiction. Knowing Ellen personally experienced much of this story gives it even more of an emotional pull, as we learn that this is based on Ellen's own daughter's story.
I'm still quite new to verse novels so it did take me a good pages which took like 20 mins to read, really - you can fly through verse books in no time to get comfortable with the writing style. Before that I kept concentrating on how I was su An immensely powerful book, Crank brings us a heartbreaking downfall into drug addiction. Before that I kept concentrating on how I was supposed to read it: vertical first or not?
For instance. I soon realized it didn't matter. Plus, by then, I was so into it I wasn't even paying attention to that at all, it had me completely engrossed. Deciding to write such a story in verse was brilliant, however. It turns it into an even more tragic tale, seeing as it leaves no room for sugar coating or frivolous sidetracking.
It gives us a blunt, ugly, and completely raw foray into addiction. If you're hesitant to read verse novels, you should force yourself to give one a try. No one is less of a poetry fan as I am - when we studied it briefly in high school, everyone seemed to find such complexity in the meaning of a single verse when I was staring at it wide-eyed thinking for sure they had not read the same thing I just had. With that said, I'm glad that I went outside my comfort zone to try a verse novel.
Crank being only my second. They offer something entirely potent from the candid nature of their storytelling. Furthermore, some of the poems in Crank are stylized in such a mesmerizing way, it makes reading it an experience like no other.
Crank is not a pretty story; it's very much the opposite. No addiction of any kind is ever pretty. This novel portrays the decent into a drug infested haze in the most realistic of ways. We have a protagonist, here, who becomes captive of what she refers to as the monster.
She even develops an alter-ego, kind of as a way to separate herself and stay in denial. We see her delude herself into believing that she is still in control, that she is not imprisoned by her addiction. She will piss you off to no end, yet you will likely still feel sympathy towards her. We see the downward spiral she is running towards, while helpless to stop it.
It's heartbreaking, really. She's blind to its impact on her own mind and body, not to mention her family. Addiction affects much more than just the person affected, and this book also portrays how, more often than not, friends and family are just as much in denial as the addict herself. Thinking up excuses for them, not wanting to admit that something is seriously wrong. Poignant and completely unforgettable, Crank is an eye-opening story that anyone touched by addiction should read.
It shows us the monstrous, but entirely realistic, road to drug addiction. View all 8 comments. Jan 05, Audrey rated it it was ok.
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. I don't want this to come across like I'm desensitized to drugs and how they can screw up someone's life, because I've personally seen that happen to many times to ever underestimate the power of addiction. And while I think it's important that YA authors write about these topics in an honest and eye-opening way, I don't think that Hopkins did that, even though her story is based on first-hand experience with meth.
I felt that much of her writing was cliche, in terms of language and description. I felt that her characters fell into stereotypical patterns and could Chase's "dialogue" have been any cheesier? The form does add some appeal to the novel, though again, I've seen that done before and done much better.
Some of these issues, I think, are because of the form's limits it's hard to develop secondary characters at all when you're writing first person poetry , but others are just limitations of the story itself. I think that there was a lot going on with Kristina that wasn't caused by the drugs -- sure, meth amplified those things, but there were other issues at the root of her bad choices and I thought the author really glossed over them maybe because she wanted to be able to lay all these problems at the feet of the "monster" rather than take some responsibility herself?
I'm not sure. View all 7 comments. This one is probably one of her more dark books, if not the darkest. This book has gritty and gorgeous prose, an addictive plot; it's thrilling and almost frightening to read, and this is a book that challenged how I perceived things. The first book I ever read by her was Burned and it remains to this day my favorite book. Gifted, excelling in school, popular, held in a high regard.
This all changes as soon as she goes to live with her father and she discovers the thing that would always call her back to it: crank crystal meth.
What starts as a fun experiment goes into her own personal hell and the struggle for her mind and her life. Ellen Hopkins's daughter was actually affected by crank. So this book is well backed up with accuracy, and Ellen witnessed the havoc that the monster wreaked on her daughter and everyone around her, and the struggle that came along with her daughter's addiction; this book is mayhem in the best way.
To the point, that she becomes a completely different person dubbed Bree. It's an amazing experiences reading this book. Ellen Hopkins has an amazing way of making you feel like you're actually living in the book. She is technically a poet, as all of her books in written in verse.
Making you say all the things you'd rather not say, at least not in mixed company. Was the fun in the fall? You're a dream I never want to wake up from. You open my eyes to things I'll never really see. You're the best thing that will ever happen to me. Be safe. Be smart. Stay you. Who I am. What chance meeting of brush and canvas painted the face you see? What made me despise the girl in the mirror enough to transform her,turn her to into a stranger, only not.
So you want to hear the whole story. Why I swerved off the high road, hard left to nowhere, recklessly indifferent to those coughing my dust, picked up speed no limits,no top end, just a high velocity rush to madness. Sunstroke and frostbite. It was all that I could ask for and completely unexpected. I expected demands. He gifted me with tenderness. I expected ego. He let me experiment. I expected disrespect. He called me beautiful. I expected him to expect perfection. He taught me all I needed to know.
Ellen Hopkins can't do any wrong in my eyes. Apr 13, Janine rated it really liked it. Part of my fears that I cannot do it justice. Simply put, this book embodies the type of literature that I live and breathe for. It's one of those books that vindicates my decision to become an educator and teach this type of literature. It also proves that not all "great" literature looks like a modern novel nor is it written by "dead white guys".
Based on Ellen Hopkins' real-life battle with her daughter's addiction, Crank gives a voice to the voicelessness of drug addiction. Instead of opting for a trite memoir, Hopkins beautifully embroils readers in her daughter's struggles. The style is like nothing I've ever encountered before; captivating, deeply unsettling, and harrowing, the tale becomes a part of you by the end.
I have a feeling this book will "stick with me" for a while. I plan on devouring them as quickly as I did this one. Interested in more of my reviews? Visit my blog! Sometimes she becomes Bree, the gi Interested in more of my reviews? When Kristina goes to Albuquerque, New Mexico to visit her dad she meets the neighbor boy Adam and her life begins the slow roll downhill.
His voice dripped Honey and cream, Irresistible poison. He was poison and he introduced her to another irresistible poison: the monster. Just trying it once and her life was forever changed. My Thoughts This is my third foray into the works of Ellen Hopkins and I have yet to be disappointed.
These are hard books and I can see why people either love them or hate them. They wrestle the difficult subjects that normal authors refuse to touch in order to avoid controversy or dispute. I can understand this; however, that makes me love this author that much more because she does wrestle these tough subjects. She tackles them to the ground and does it with gusto. Her books just simply are take it or leave it. Apr 08, Kai rated it really liked it.
Not that kind of screwed, what I mean is, they're always on the short end of things. The way things work, how guys feel great, but make girls feel cheap for doing exactly what they beg for. The way they get to play you, all the while claiming they love you and making you believe it's true. The way it's okay to gift their heart one day, a backhand the next, to move on to the apricot when the peach blushes and bruises. These things make me believe God's a man after all.
But this novel made me feel all kinds of things that I don't ever want to experience. It was a scary, emotional, tough and eye-opening read. Find more of my books on Instagram View 1 comment. Sep 22, Kelli rated it it was amazing Shelves: favorites , ya.
Everything about this book is different from anything I have ever read. It is small and thick kind of shaped like a bag of cornmeal however had I not started it at 10 PM, I would most definitely have read it in one sitting.
Written in prose that changes shape and font from page to page, it is a terrifying, brilliant, important, tremendously sad story based upon the life of the author's seventeen year old daughter. Unique, seemingly honest and authentic, and a very quick, compulsive read. I'm s Everything about this book is different from anything I have ever read. I'm still shuddering inside.
I do not typically do well with trilogies but I will try the next in this series. I'm changing my rating to five for the prose alone. No, not doing drugs.
But seeing stories about people who do drugs. It amazes me how a substance can change a person so quickly. How it can make your life escalate and then sink it as quick as a heartbeat.
I have only seen it before on television. Skins UK to be exact. Seen the lives of countless teenagers being destroyed by a substance, right before my very eyes.
But like the drug itself, I was addicted see more. I needed more, so I became attached to Crank. I had a strange need for more stories about teens and drugs. I wanted to get into their heads.
I needed to feel what they felt in the safest way possible. It became an addiction of my own, but hardly on the level of addiction those teenagers faced.
Crank is a novel written in verse-poetry. It follows a sixteen-year-old girl who discovers a monster. In sparse, beautiful words, she describes how her life changes and she becomes someone else, literally.
She explains how she first got into drugs and what came in the aftermath. She tells us how her need for more made her life a true living Hell, and how it tore her away from her family. It shows us how Kristina is no longer Kristina, but how she is now a person much unlike herself, Bree. I could not put that book down. I read for about half an hour when I first picked it in the early hours of the morning while the rest of the world slept.
I got around hundred or so pages in before the following hours of the next morning, where I began to devour the book and refused could to put it down from then on. It had easily become my own drug, and I needed to feel the rush in one whole turn, instead small, uninspired spurts. Perhaps it is because the poetry was so much more refreshing and different from my usual prose, but something incredibly special about it made it impossible to ignore.
The writing style was fantastic. I am a newcomer to poetry, yet I loved every word that Ellen Hopkins wrote for me.
I say me because I felt as if I alone read the novel, and that I was not simply part of the thousands of others who had read the book from all around the world. The words flowed so naturally and struck so many raw emotions into my heart. Not only that, but the words played our eyes, descending down the pages in different shapes and structures, like skylines in a vast city and beating hearts trying to break free from the pain.
The story was heartbreaking. To see what Kristina had gone through, and to have her think everything was just as it should be, set me on a rage. I wanted to desperately save this girl. I wanted to take her into my arms and hold her tightly until she had recovered. I became the person she wanted to be.
I wanted to feel safe and secure but she took me even further into Hell. She had help in her decline, and it drew hatred from me toward those involved. I must admit that at times I wonder what would happen to me if I were ever to take drugs. I wonder what might happen if I smoked weed or popped a few pills. Even though I read and see these stories, it does not show what I might go through.
But, living in the lives of these teenagers, going down with them and not being able to get back up, it helps me greatly to stay away from these monsters and the destruction they cause. There are so many people out there, all over the world, who do not have that kind of help.
They do not know what they are getting into when they take their first hit or their first puff or their first snort of their first line. It will take any who are willing to let. May 08, Kate rated it it was amazing Shelves: youngadult. Kristina is a bright, good kid. But now, Kristina is gone. Bree has taken her place. Bree is dangerous. Bree is willing to try anything. Bree craves the monster. Bree craves crank. On a trip to visit her father, Kristina meets Adam. Adam introduces her to crank.
Kristina never would have even spoken to Adam. That was all Bree. Kristina never would have Kristina is a bright, good kid. Kristina never would have been attracted to Chase or Brendan. Kristina never would have made the choices Bree made.
But Bree is in control now. Bree does not exist because of the crank; Bree causes the crank to happen. Bree exists beneath the surface long before the drugs set her free. The novel is heartbreaking—the reader can see where Kristina is headed, but never stops hoping that something will turn her from her path. The use of verse is particularly effective in this novel. Even the formatting of the poems is significant.
I was originally quite skeptical about this format, but I thoroughly enjoyed the book, and felt that the use of this format added an extra dimension to the story. While Crank is not preachy, it does have a fairly clear anti-drug message that may be more effective than a more heavy-handed approach.
Her stepfather, Scott, recognized the signs of addiction, but her parents ultimately did nothing save grounding her.
It was established that her parents had some knowledge of the drug scene dating back to their youth, but did not use this knowledge to help her. I found that unrealistic. View all 4 comments. Nov 04, Sandra rated it really liked it. I have read books on incest, abuse and alcoholism. Crank is actually one of those books. Crank is a story about how a normal teenage girl became a substance abuser. It was written in meaningful verses that would keep you glued to its pages. Kristina was as shy and reserved.
Bree was fun and outgoing. Kristina is Bre Life was good before I met the monster. Kristina is Bree. Bree is Kristina. Kristina faded into the background when she met the monster. Adam introduced her to crank. Bree gets addicted. She is now dependent to the monster. Kristina loses control over herself to Bree. This is a seriously sad story. Kristina had a good life. Not perfect but good. Search for Author Book Series. Added by 21 of our members.
Ellen Hopkins's semi-autobiographical verse novel, Crank , reads like a Go Ask Alice for the 21st century. In it, she chronicles the turbulent and often disturbing relationship between Kristina, a character based on her own daughter, and the "monster," the highly addictive drug crystal meth, or "crank. She lives in Carson City, Nevada, with her husband and son.
Crank 1. Crank 2. Glass 3. Fallout Burned 1. Burned 2. Smoke Impulse 1. Impulse 2. Perfect Tricks 1. Tricks 2. Traffick
0コメント