Ellen Hopkins is a novelist who writes her books in the form of poetry. With the same character development and plotline as a regular novel, it has the added literary devices that a poem would contain, including some interestingly formed passages. Hopkins writes all her books in this style, giving her novels a unique and interesting feel.
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Hopkins is most famous for her Trilogy on meth addiction. The first book of this series is called Crank, with the next two following being Glass and Fallout. This series follows a young girl, Kristina, struggling with her addiction with “the monster,” a metaphor for meth and her relationship with addiction (another poetic technique). The next two books focus on the next generations of her family and how they are affected by the events of the first book. The story is based loosely on Hopkins’ daughter’s battle with meth.
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Aside from this famous trilogy, Hopkins has over 15 books that focus on societal issues, written in the same poetic style as the Crank series. These books talk about hard topics: eating disorders, psychiatric hospitals, sex trafficking, bullying, and loss. Using angsty teenage characters, Hopkins is able to portray these sensitive subject in a lighthearted and relatable way for her young adult audience.
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If her style of poetry and interesting topics doesn’t draw you in, Hopkins even writes from the perspective of each individual character and gives them their own story within her books.
Each chapter shifts the focus so we as readers can understand the internal struggle of everyone within the book. Techniques such as these make Ellen Hopkins one of the most unique and powerful writers that I have come across.
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