How did you make the move from writing articles to writing books? And what was it like when your very first book came out? Though your big splash was Crank, you actually published over 20 nonfiction books for children before your first novel in verse (and YA bestseller) came out, and before that you were a freelance journalist. She is also currently raising three grandchildren under twelve, but was kind enough to make time for this interview over email. Verse novels and “difficult” subjects have become her trademark over the past fifteen years since Crank, she has published twelve more YA novels in verse, tackling topics from suicide to sex trafficking to eating disorders, and three adult novels, two of which are also in verse.Įllen lives on 1.25 acres of Nevada hills overlooking Washoe Lake, on her website, and-for about a hundred days each year-on the road. This provides a very natural sense of delivery, as if the five stories are being delivered without reflection, just the words of the moment.Ellen Hopkins is a life-long writer who exploded onto the New York Times’ bestseller list in 2004 with Crank, a novel written in free verse that was loosely based on her daughter’s real struggles with “the monster”-crystal meth. Her lines flow smoothly into one another, sometimes between stanzas. The poetry is a vehicle, one Hopkins has under firm control. Each narrator has a different rhythm, but still a simple rhythm. LGBT youth are much more likely to be pressured into prostitution, particularly survival sex. At the same time, I do think she under-represents LGBT youth, despite two of the narrators being gay. His life is kept under strict control and he doesn't have the power to say no. Seth ends up a high-class kept boy, but she doesn't glamorize his situation. Hopkins also puts in the effort to show different situations that could lead to sex work and different types of sex work. And, of course, all of their lives end up touching on the sex trade. Several of the narrators end up hooked on drugs. Seth and Ginger are both abused sexually as children. That doesn't mean the subject matter isn't brutal. This is not 600 pages of endless degradation. Hopkins takes her time setting up each teenager's story. They're located throughout the US, from differing economic situations, and differing home stability. Cody Bennett is losing his beloved stepfather to cancer and thinks that his family will be okay if he can just win the next bet.

Ginger Cordell is crushing on her classmate Alexis and crushed by her irresponsible mother, who is a hooker. Whitney Lang just wants someone to notice her instead of her perfect older sister. Eden Streit is a preacher's daughter and knows that she has to keep her atheist boyfriend a secret. Seth Parnell is stifled on his dad's Indiana farm, and seeks escape with an older boyfriend in the (bigger) city.

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