Crank

Labeled one of the New York Times bestsellers, Ellen Hopkin’s Crank is a novel that is both praised and rebuked for its bold confrontation with drug addiction along with many other motifs of adolescents. Crank was published in 2004 as a personal reflection to Hopkin’s personal experience with her own daughter and was, perhaps, a little too real for its intended audience. Due to its explicit content, this book has been banned, yet it seems to have no difficulty being a popular and well circulated text that has passed through the hands of teens and adults alike.

Kristina Georgia Snow is a sixteen year old junior in high with excellent grades and stays out of trouble; however from the very beginning readers see Kristina rebuke this ideal personality. Instead, readers are introduced to Bree, Kristina’s alter ego. Bree is the dark side of Kristina, the explorer, experimenter and troublemaker. This story follows a good girl gone bad, but also the struggle of finding and saving that good girl again.

Running from a mother she doesn’t connect with, a strict stepfather, a homomsexual older sister, and an anoying little brother, Kristina tries to find solace in her father. Much to her dismay, Kristina’s dad was not the “Prince of Albuquerque” that she believed him to be when she was younger. Despite this, it is in Albuquerque that she meets her first love, Adam, boyfriend of her father’s neighbor, who introduces her to the “monster”, aka crack, or crank. Kristina quickly finds out her mother was right about her dad, about his “bad habits” that she divorced him for. Unfortunately, her dad’s addiction left with lack of judgement and allowed Kristina, or more precisely Bree,  to tango with the monster.

Ensnared by her lust of the drug, Kristina struggles to control herself but to no avail with the added complications of falling for Adam. They exchange proclamation of love but never make it past the kissing phase, due to his official girlfriend, Lince, becoming hospitalized and Kristina having to return home with her mother and siblings. Kristina’s family notices the change in her, though not knowing it was a change brought on by drug addiction. After her return home, she continues to associate with the wrong crowd, choosing to get involved with two boys romantically. Good girl Kristina held strong, though and convinced her co-personality to keep from losing the big “v”.

The first boy, Brendan, was a lifeguard who immediately received the stamp of approval from Kristina’s mother and who had enough charm and crank to keep the teen girl interested. Chase Wagner, however, was the bad boy type no mother wanted her daughter to date. Appealing more to Kristina than Bree, Chase proved to be more than expected. Torn between her lingering love for Alex, fun and charming Brendan, and dark and suave Chase, Kristina was faced with a serious love addiction, the worst and most dangerous of all being the love of the monster. Kristina discovered looks were not as they seem.  Kristina is raped by Brendan and she falls deeper into the trap of drugs, rebellion, and sexual desire for Chase. Chase the bad boy expresses his love for Kristina, and readers are meant to believe in his sincerity.

Every episode of this novel is dowsed with Kristina’s drug addiction, love conflicts, and a broken relationship with her mother. Her mother realized that the Kristina she knew was gone, replaced by a rebellious character fed by bad habits. Kristina is constantly grounded, yet love and concern is given from both her mother and stepfather. As Kristina’s life began to teeter on the fence of control and chaos, she becomes sick; Kristina is pregnant and the baby’s father is not Chase, the love of her life who, after finding out she was pregnant, proposed to her. Instead, the baby’s father is  none other than her rapist, Brendan.

Kristina contemplates having an abortion as well as giving her baby up for adoption, but chooses to tell her mother instead and keep the baby. At the end of the novel, Kristina states that she can not give her readers a happy ending, for she is still caught up in her addiction as well as adapting to being a teenage mom. However, readers are given hope that there is some happiness to be found over the head of the monster.

Hopkins brings the topic of drug addiction and teenage sexuality front and center in Crank. Issues deemed too dark to bring to light, sex and drugs often become factors that would call for red tape and warning signs. Fear of exposing negative behavior to adolescents is what keeps books like Crank in the banned section, away from school libraries and curriculum, but attracts even more the curious eyes of teeangers. Why is that? Crank is a novel full of teenage angst. Unlike some novels taught to condition high school in academia or popular, non-explicit fiction to keep them entertained, Crank is structured to connect to its audience on a immediate, realistic level. It acknowledges the truth of real life scenarios and warns against ignorance, even on the adult’s part. Readers are meant to share in the frustration of Kristina’s struggle with her alter ego, to cheer her on when she resists the crank and also to offer understanding when she gives into temptations.

The book characterizes a type adolescent who seeks personal stability and love. When love is not found at home, teenagers may take love from strangers or dangerous pleasures. Kristina represents a vulnerable girl who yearns to be strong, yet does not want to fully relent the care of her parents. Hopkins, a mother herself, puts partial blame on Kristina’s mother for how Kristina turned out, in order to retell the lesson she herself had to learn about her teenage daughter. The world of adult horrors is very real and may sneak into the life of adolescents. Teens do face drugs, set, and violence, no matter how ignorant adults are to this fact. Crank portrays adolescence as a time of not-so-innocent adventures and cruelties of life but also alternatives.

Chase, the bad boy, defied expectations of the drug and sex scene. Treating Kristina with the love he claimed to have towards her, Chase refused to take advantage of her, insisting that they wait before having sex, and even expressing his limitations when it came to doing drugs. Kristina’s own objections to sex, contrasting Bree’s agreements, shows that although teens are surrounding by many things they do have a want for self control and boundaries.

As adolescence is a time where teens are discovering boundaries, it is important that adults set and enforce examples, giving teens a foundation to stand on and carry through for the adult years. Perhaps Kristina’s father’s lack of boundaries caused her delve deeper into Bree’s world than Kristina had originally intended, and perhaps Kristina’s mother’s tougher love and support allowed Kristina some sort of balance to keep her from falling deeper down the wrong path and drowning in her addiction.

Although Crank gives realistic insight into topics that are very relevant to teenagers, it still creates controversy due to its detailed account about drugs–an issue that never goes away– sex and even rape. Perhaps it is unsettling to see a promising sixteen year old girl caught up in such an explicit world, only for her story to end with her dating the bad boy, having her rapist’s baby, and still struggling with drug addiction. However, despite how unsettling it all is, it is very much real, and this is a story in which many teens can relate to in some way.

This book may be banned but it is still high in demand and continues to connect to young readers. Instead of excluding Crank from school libraries, perhaps it should instead be taught in order to enlighten, caution, and support teens to help them find boundaries and teach them how to encounter whatever hardships life brings. Crank offers a reflection on a topic that is often underrepresented in the proper way, and thus, presenting teens with meaningful material to help them cope and understand their own situations.

Hopkins, Ellen. Crank. New York: Margaret K. McElderry Books, 2004. Print.