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RR#1:
In the book “Crank” by Ellen Hopkins we are immediately introduced to the main character Kristina Snow, or better know as her alter ego throughout the book as Bree. Bree is an adolescent girl who is in a difficult family dynamic which leads her into the world of mischief and drug abuse. Hopkins uses this loosely based true story to bring to light the way that family issues, self consciousness, and many other things can lead to drug use. She suggest that possibly being around people, such as Bree’s dad and short term lover in Albuquerque, can influence the decisions you make when it comes to the choice of using substances.We first read Bree’s perspective of distorted reality where she reveals how this substance has impacted how she views and interacts with her own family members. Referring to her younger brother as “spoiled and shameless” (4) and even her own mother as “in her midlife quest for fame.” (4) This drug has changed her perspective on how she views her own family members that she lives with, and maybe this gives us a foreshadow on to why she goes and stays with her father and Albuquerque for a while. This also impacting how she views herself as a person, saying “there is no perfect daughter, no gifted high-school junior, no Kristina Georgia Snow. There is only Bree.” (5) Bree being the alter ego that comes out when exposed to the substance, she no longer sees herself as the everyday teenage girl who goes to school and makes straight A’s and have lots of friends. It is almost revealing that she is letting this one thing take over her entire life and shift basically every aspect of it. Further into the story, we see this new relationship that has sprung up between Bree and the mysterious boy she has seen shadowing her. When they first met, it was the cupcake phase and they started slow, with just marijuana which she was okay with. But, being around someone who is into hard core substance such as ‘crank,’ can be pretty hard to say no when it’s presented to you. During the bowling alley scene, Bree & Adam decide to go to the back and get high together on a serious drug, she explains how when she heard her dad’s voice while high that she “..thought it was the funniest thing i’d ever heard.” (99) Prior to getting caught. But sadly, after her father realized what is actually going on since he himself is involved in the drug use world extremely heavily, he says to his own daughter and her boyfriend, “Okay then. Fix me a line.” (101) So now, Bree not only has one bad influence around her, but now she lives with one also. The author uses all of these aspects to reveal the character development of not only Kristina, but her alter ego Bree throughout the story. This could help us with foreshadowing possible events to come, and to help us get a better perspective of why she is doing what she is. It reveals how she starts out as an average girl living with her mother, step father, and siblings, into a girl living with her drug addict father under a different name who gets caught up in a world that is going to eventually kill her or hurt any potential she has. It shows us how important other characters are and how they can impact how our main character turns out in the end, and all of the decisions that they make on the way there that they may not even realize will have these serious repercussions. RR#2:
Transitioning into the second part of “Crank” by Ellen Hopkins, the story begins to peak but also fail. Our main character has returned home, but is facing many challenges and complications that she did not anticipate. Hopkins here is possibly using this “personal” story as a scare tactic to show the results of getting caught up in drug addiction and abuse. During this part of the story, Ellen Hopkins reveals to is what happens when Kristina, or better known as Bree, returns home with a drug problem. She shows all of the confusion and minor withdraws that she experiences, she even mentions when she first returns home that Kristina says to herself, “despite Bree, demanding I find a way to get high, as if I had a clue where to get crank back here in Kristina Land.” Here she is showing us that her coming home addicted to the crank substance, she now had to find a way to support and facilitate her drug addiction back home where substances aren’t as easy to find. She also shows how becoming a product of drug addiction it impacted the relationships she has with people back home, including some of her bestfriends. In one instance, Kristina is on the phone with her longtime best friend Sarah who was going on and on about nonsense. Kristina, or Bree, makes the comment “Kristina could listen to Sarah talk for hours. Bree was ready to scream.” So why is she emphasizing this sudden change, and what influenced this change? We can assume it has something to do with the substance abuse she became a part of at her father’s. Further into the book, she also shows us the more common side effects and outcomes of drug addiction and short-term tolerance breaks you could say. She begins talking about how, “all those days with little or no sustenance hit me in one awful instant.” How her not having access to this drug was an experience of actual sickness she had to go through, and then she also joked how enthusiastic she is that her Mother’s kitchen was stocked way better than her Father’s. She also comes up in the situation where her & the boy from Albuquerque decide to start seeing other people, and her mom comes for comfort offering to one day sit down and discuss all the things that happened during her trip. She starts replaying all of the things the happened while she was away, knowing most of it would be diluted with lies or not said at all. She acknowledges this when saying, “I never dared mention sex, interrupted by periods, Lince interrupted by drugs; or my own infatuation with the monster’s spectacular rock and roll. No, these secrets belonged strictly in my own private closet.” She is aware how if her mom knew these things would impact their relationship and how she is treated, and possibly her freedom. All of this secrecy and pain Kristina is experiencing early into arriving back home, simply because she decided to abuses drugs back in Albuquerque. All in all, Ellen Hopkins uses a lot of descriptive language and minor scare tactics to reveal the outcome of drug abuse. She shows how it can impact many aspects of your life including some of the not so obvious ones, regarding relationships and simply the quality of life. Kristina, or Bree, shows how switching locations can impact your accessibility to these substances and that can cause you to experience certain withdrawal symptoms or even things such as minor to even major behavior changes. She is bringing awareness to the side of drug addiction we may not alway see in the media or in our daily lives, but that is important. AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesNo Archives |