Crank by Ellen Hopkins

This book was published in 2004 and I never purchased it for my library because I hadn't read it. Anytime I walk into Waldenbooks in the mall and see 15 copies of an old book in paperback, I get nervous. Popularity with teenagers doesn't always make a good match for a high school library. But after reading this young adult novel in free verse, I realized that the concrete poems were fabulous. Hopkins has a real talent for using the visual aspect of her work to her advantage. Sometimes I didn't even notice the shape until after I read the page. I am impressed.

Kristina Shaw is a good girl who lives with her mom and step-dad, but three weeks with her dad down in Albuquerque results in major changes. She finds a bad boy who gives her crank (meth). Not only that, but she discovers that her dad does it, too. Ugh. Talk about disappointing. Her dad could have prevented all this, but instead pulls up a chair and asks for some drugs. Strange. So now, Bree (the other girl inside Kristina) is looking for meth or ecstasy or whatever else she can find to keep her high. Her grades slide, her attitude stinks, and her old friends abandon her. The poetry really gives the reader a sense of what it is like to take meth, and it isn't all fun and games. Sure, there are the high parts, but the low parts take over. Kristina is raped and she makes horrible decisions while high. She loses everything in her life and then finds out she is pregnant.

This book was a little too much like Go Ask Alice for me, but probably this is new to most teenage readers. It's the "Don't Do Drugs" book for the new century. A little too preachy for me at the end, but most teen readers probably wouldn't complain.