Non fiction blog

          Ellen Hopkins, author of Crank, Burned, Impulse, Glass, Identical, Tricks, and Fallout, wrote a controversial article called, "Banned Books Week 2010: An Anti-Censorship Manifesto." Ellen Hopkins writes some very controversial books, often having to do with subjects such as drugs, violence, abuse, and other subjects, that can cause readers, especially parents, some alarm. This caused Hopkins to write this article, talking about the people who ban her books. 
          In the article, Hopkins mentions how book banners almost never read the books that they ban and only skim the pages for "dirty words and sexual content." I, personally, find this unfair to Hopkins, or any author that has had a book banned. Books like Hopkins' can be beneficial to students facing the same issues as the characters in her books. Unfortunately, a lot of the book banners or "gatekeepers" are parents. Ellen Hopkins says that she has had situations where she was scheduled too speak at a school about poetry, but a parent read about the content in Hopkins' books and told the superintendent not to let her speak at any school in the district, and that all of her books should be taken from the shelves of every school in that same district. Unfortunately, the superintendent agreed, even though both had never read the books. But this wasn't the first time Hopkins was dis-invited from speaking at a school. A librarian became concerned after hearing two parents complain, and after reading about Hopkins' books on a website that rates books for content. Again, they hadn't read any of her books.
         After sharing the story of her two dis-invitations, Hopkins went on to state, "If you don't want to child to read a book, take it away. But you do not have the right to decide "appropriateness" for everyone." I agree with this statement because if I wasn't allowed to read a book, or hear an author speak just because someone else's parent wasn't okay with it, I know I would be pretty annoyed. I also agree with Hopkins' next two statements, " What's perhaps not right for one child is necessary for another."and "Those whose lives are touched by the issues I write about deserve to know they're not alone. I agree with Ellen Hopkins because you never know who can benefit from books like hers. And book banners should know that they don't have the right to decide what's best for everybody, and that those people need to decide fro themselves.

Shine by Lauren Myracle

I recently finished Shine by Lauren Myracle. Shine is about teenagers living in an intolerant town in the South. In the beginning of the book, the reader is shown an article in a newspaper about a hate crime against a gay boy, who was beaten and left for dead outside of a gas station with a gas pump nozzle shoved down his throat, and a hateful message scrawled across his chest. The protagonist in Shine is a lonely, former friend of the boy,  Patrick. This girl, had shut everyone out of her life, including her family and her best friend. So when Patrick was nearly killed, she felt lonelier than ever.

In Shine, I can't help but notice how different this town is, and the protagonist's school is from mine. For  example, at my school, topics such as gay marriage are openly discussed, and I would say nearly everyone is respectful of  others sexuality. However in the protagonist 's school and community, gay people are treated and talked about like aliens. Such as when the protagonist overheard  two women  gossiping at church about how Patrick shouldn't be in the children's wing of the  hospital because he would try to make  them gay.  I found this odd for a few different reasons. The first being that these women were extremely ignorant, and the second, even if Patrick was a serial killer, HE WAS IN A COMA!!!!!!So compared to my city, and community., this town seems really  ignorant and  perhaps scared. Scared, maybe because there is something that they don't know, and are not used to, which can be  scary for some people. But on the other hand, I find these people, well, stupid. Like I-want-to-smack-you-in-the-face-because-you're-being- so-stupid. But unfortunately I can't because you are in. a book. But that doesn't mean there aren't people like that in the world. So I guess I want to smack those people too.  But you can't go around smacking people in the face, so you just sit on your couch at home and watch them talk about how gay marriage will lead to marriage with animals, and the. You yell at the TV and I''m off topic.

 What I'm trying to say is, Shine is a work of fiction,  but  it isn't unrealistic. It is a  perfect example of all the ignorance and stupidity in our country and in the world. Shine has a plot that pulls you into the book while also making you think about your own community, and comparing it to the one in Shine. I have found that I am very happy to live in a city that is very open, and full of people who just don't care.

Glass Blog Post

Lucie Pascarosa        806

A man once said “There is creative reading as well as creative writing.” Ellen Hopkins has managed to do both in her book Glass. Glass is about an eighteen-year-old girl named Kristina who throws her entire life away for crystal methamphetamine. Glass is the sequel to Crank, which is the start of the protagonist’s battle with meth. The protagonist is actually a fictionalized version of Hopkins' daughter, as Glass is loosely based on a true story. An artistic detail I noticed in Glass, is that the author shapes the text in different forms that vary from page to page.

   

In each chapter, or section (chapters typically consist of one or two pages) of Glass, the text is shaped differently, warped into different shapes and forms such as letters, numbers, dollar signs, disarrays, and many more. I think the author uses this to add an extra element to the plot, and to emphasize a certain detail in that chapter. For example, about a fourth into the book the protagonist, Kristina is lying to her mother about stealing money, so the text is shaped into a big capital “L”. In another part of the book, Kristina is kicked out of her mother’s home; the text is shaped into six, short diagonal, downward lines.  Besides Crank and Glass, Ellen Hopkins uses this in many of her young adult books such as Identical, Fallout, and Impulse. I think that Ellen Hopkins writes in this way in a lot of her books because she really wants to show the reader the emotions the character is feeling on that page, or the hard decision the protagonist has to make, such as in Glass, when Kristina has to chose between meth and her child, which she gave life to in Crank. I also believe that Hopkins shapes the text into these forms because she wants to emphasize a theme and an issue that the protagonist is facing, such as when she shaped the text into a spiral when Kristina’s life was slowly going downhill after trying meth for the first time.

   

Overall, I think Ellen Hopkins includes this aspect of forming the text into different shapes and styles because she wants to send a message to he reader. And not just any message, she wants to take the reader for a walk in that character’s shoes, to get the reader to feel what they’re feeling, and if not that, to at least sympathize with that character, I think this feature really gives Glass a special element that makes it different from most other books, and really draws you in, and makes you want to know more about these characters.